Monkeys with Car Keys

"All we are, basically, are monkeys with car keys."
-Northern Exposure (1990)

I read (and so should you) a great essay this week. It's all about the film (and philosophy behind) I Heart Huckabees. It's a nicely honed, much less expletive laced (than anything I am capable of producing) way of explaining (what I call) Transcendental Nihilism.

It turns out, a lot of people think this way, though they might not call it the same thing. I'd be worried about being unoriginal if, at this point, I believed it was possible to be interconnected (and I am very certain we all are) and "original". The thing is y'all, we think the same thoughts, often at the same time, but for many different reasons. Our different reasons are usually just by-products of our different experiences. Our different experiences and the cortical pruning that happens as a result, make us who we are. But, as Woody Allen's Grandma said in the classic "Northern Exposure", we're still just monkeys with car keys...sitting on the branches of infinity, chittering subconsciously into our stomach-ears.

I continue to arrive (like I said a couple of posts ago) at the same conclusion: many of our woes are caused by separation anxiety caused by the illusion that we can actually disconnect from one another. At this point, I don't even bother trying, other than earplugs.

Interdependence. It's what makes being life such a fucking hay ride. That, of course, and NyQuil.

Yes, I know I've been wearing Bossy Pants this week. I like to share fun where I find it.