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.Flower bedsacross our God-kissed nation rear up from the bones of the dead, their deathbringing new life and beauty into the world they have left.My father is buried under roses.Yes, there were the charnel pits.There were the death trucks with theirslowly tolling bell.Manned mostly by garbage men in cities they carried awaythousands and do so still in places.But when people really grasped how messedup things had become and when they had the land many of their family membersended up in a flower bed.Personally, I'd have preferred that, wouldn't you?But then came the next step.What do you do when the world has so clearly comeapart? Radio reports indicate that nothing is working, anywhere.The Federalgovernment is telling people to do the best they can until help arrives.I'll describe later what happened in low trust countries.But this narrativeis about the happy suburban family, an environment where societal trust,believe me, is probably the highest it has been in recorded history.Peoplegrowing up in suburbs just don't know how unusual they are.That "it looks thesame all over" is boring as hell but it's a function of high trust.The U.S.is a strange country.Growing up in it I never realized that, butspending those tours overseas really brought it home.We're just fuckingweird.Alex de Touqueville spoke of this weirdness in his book Democracy in Americaway back in the 1800s."Americans, contrary to every other society I havestudied, form voluntary random social alliances."Look, let's drill that down a bit and look at that most American ofactivities: The Barn Raising.I know that virtually none of you have ever participated in a barn raising.But everyone knows what I mean.A family in an established commuity that hasgotten to the point they can build a barn or need a new one or maybe a newpioneer family that needs a barn puts out the word.There's going to be a barnraising on x day, usually Saturday or Sunday.Page 41 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlPeople from miles around walk over to the family's farm and work all dayraising the barn.Mostly the guys do the heavy work while women work on food.That evening everybody gets together for a party.They sleep out or in the newbarn, then walk home the next day to their usual routine.ONLY HAPPENS IN AMERICA.Only ever happened in America.It is a purely American invention and is frominconceivable to repugnant to other cultures.A group of very near strangers in that they are not family or some extendedtribe gather together in a "voluntary random social alliance" to aid anotherfamily for no direct benefit to themselves.The family that is getting thebarn would normally supply some major food and if culturally acceptable andavailable some form of alcohol.But the people gathering to aid them haveaccess to the same or better.There is a bit of a party afterwards but asocial gathering does not pay for a hard day's work.(And raising a barn is ahard day's work.)The benefit rests solely in the trust that when another family needs aid, theaided family will do their best to provide such aid.Trust.Americans form "voluntary random social alliances." Other societies do not.Low trust societies in the U.S.do not.The kumbayas trying to build swingsfor the neighborhood children assumed the willingness of their "rainbow"neighbors to form a "voluntary random social alliance" for mutual benefit anddiscovered how rare American are.In other countries an extended family might gather together to raise the barnor some other major endeavor.But this is not a voluntary random alliance.They turn up because the matriarch or patriarch has ordered it.And family isanything but random societally.(However random it may seem from the inside.)This leads to the next stage of the narrative of our family.The motherperforms an inventory of what they have.She considers heading to the hills.Many did.But most, those that survived and lived in high trust areas, thendid something unthinkable in most areas of the world: They set out to helptheir neighbors.Note: In many areas of the world, most neighbors would be extended family.Inthose areas, similar things happened.But they stopped at the level ofextended family.From there on out, it became the government's problem.Theking is supposed to fix big disasters.Individuals help their family as muchas they can and then it's up to the king.The king will tell us what to do.The mother of this narrative, and it's documented in at least twenty studiesthat it happened in all "high trust" zones in the United States, then wentnext door.There she found one of her neighor's children dead, another aliveand very nearly psychotic.The child clings to her and she comforts her.Thenshe suggests that the child go play with her children.Children will recovertheir feet quickly when given anything orderly and common.The child ismarginally functional by the time she goes back to the house.Long-termeffects may be high, but right now functional is all that matters.She returns to the house.In this case the wife is dead and the husband in thelast throes of the cerebral portion of the progression.She removes herfriend's body from the bed and gives the husband as much support as she can.Note: One function of the H5N1 is that children rarely suffered from thecerebral infection stage or did so moderately.This was across the board andthe clinical rationale is still poorly understood.The hypothesis (unproven)is that kids' bodies, due to growth hormones and such, tended to hold theblood in despite systemic flu.Thus they didn't suffer as much from cerebraland other organic breakdown.No solid clinical data but that's thehypothesis.Thus, unfortunately, children often broke out of their illness to find deadparents.Kids, keep that in mind when your parents are freaking out if you geta mild fever.The reason you only have one or two grandparents is that yourparents found their parents dead of the Plague.The support helps.One of the secondary mortality effects of H5N1 was oftenPage 42 ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmldeath from dehydration
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Tematy
IndexJohn Norman Gor 04 Nomads of Gor
John Norman Gor 01 Tarnsman of Gor
John Norman Gor 23 Renegades of Gor
John DeChancie Castle 07 Castle Spellbound
John Norman Gor 12 Beasts of Gor
John Dalmas Farside 01 The Lion of Farside
John Norman Gor 21 Mercenaries of Gor
Szalony Kapelusznik Aniol Stroz
Nora Roberts Znak Siedmiu #2 Magia i krew
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