The distant landscape gazes the same vistas the nomadic tribes navigated for thousands of years. Following the herds and seasons with no ownership to the lands or the times. Chinook, Paiute, Ute, and Navajo were earth’s stewards. John C. Fremont sketched the land’s curves… Manifest Destiny abhorred the unknown. Mountain ranges with jagged ridges line the outer rim of my seeable distance. Today’s concrete trails chase the easiest route along the topography, connecting civilization to civilization. Many signs of human life from the window of a Southwest Airline 737 cruising at 30,000 feet.

Seattle is two hours away from Las Vegas — takeoff to touch down flying the pack mule of the sky. Southwest Airlines is the only way I fly these days; a perfect marriage of free market capitalism and equality. Class does not exist once the jetway doors open. Buy a ticket, find a seat, take a ride. This evening’s flight looks to be the mirror image of all outbound Vegas flights — a cabin full of sobering leisure hounds putting their vacation in the rearview mirror. Overpriced liquor flushing out of their systems and the pending return to reality setting in. Vacations over folks! Get back to funding the American Dream.

Seattle walkabout

If you can hear me Big Foot, “Change is inevitable, floor plans are optional.”

I have a day to myself before the 1100 mile road tripping journey begins tomorrow. Brook is finishing his final day of teaching before Spring Break 2017. What better way to connect with the indigenous than a good walkabout. These are the folks who call into C∙SPAN with logic and clarity. Counter balancing the missing links of fly-over country. I head off for a walk through northern Seattle communities with rain filling my low tops. Off in the distance is the Space Needle, which is obstructed by layers of dense overcast. Up to 25% cloud cover allows for a muted silhouette of the sun. These poor bastards have only seen a muted sun nine days over a six month Vitamin D deficient winter. I would turn if force to live in these conditions. Heaven, the hardened shall contemplate. But no rage in the streets or sidewalks. To cold. Blood is thick in these folks. Won’t course through the veins at these temperature. No room for anger, this is the top of the food chain. The emerald city on the hill digitally fueled by 21^st century consumptionism.

One should shed little pity to this area. Amazon money floats along the skyline just above the never-ending cloud cover. Great place to hide it! Recreational grass dispensaries rival the Starbucks business model of, “one or two on every corner.” Air in this part of the country is clear, moist, and unregulated. The roadside litter is even nouveau riche hipster — PBR cans, $10 bodega coffee cups, and loafs of bread made from glutton-free wheat grown in organic infused compost and surely certified by a lynch-mob of social conscious pricks. We shall shame you to change!

The world is far from falling apart on the Puget Sound. Jeff Bezos is the top predator in free market capitalism. The tip of his digital spear is crusted with fat retail robber baron blubber. Don’t mind him folks. Just selling some used books online. Two decades later he has killed more retail jobs than The Great Depression. “Point, click, purchase, repeat” is merely the morning calisthenics for the slaughter house employees of the middle class. We are co-conspirators in our own economic extinction. Fear the combustible engine tail pipe?!?! I submit not. Fear the direct to consumers hype! Every search or interweb purchase is pumping cancer into the market… killing the workers, the pickers, the sellers, the stockers, the drivers, the retailers, the managers, the counters, the teachers, the finders, the minders, and the lot. But the floor plans in Seattle high-rise condos have endless options.