Cranberry Vanilla Trailmix Crunch and the Pursuit of Happiness

Well today was the Jewish day of Repentance: Yom Kippur. A fast day. No food from 6:30 the night before until 7:30 the night of. Not a tremendous feat but enough to make you really really hungry. I have an inimitable way of always breaking my fast with a ridiculously heavy food and eating it with great fervor, such that I am almost always struck woefully ill immediately following. Nonetheless, fasting in such a way truly makes me appreciate food; my tenacity towards eating, though tonight it is cut short due to self induced over-eager-indulgancy, will commence with renewed zeal tomorrow. Multiple bowls of my favorite Cranberry Vanilla Trailmix Crunch will be consumed. Fasting like this truly brings to light what a joy and a privilege eating actually is. A privilege we modernized humans take highly for granted. I may even go as far to say that the ease to which food is attainable is one of the single most principal reasons for the turmoil which exists within so many minds today. Depression, anxiety, lament, rage, so often directed towards the self or towards others... but why. Well a friend of mine (Michael O. Jones) recently posited that man's plight all started when we developed hands, a brilliant theory which I cannot properly expound upon; the theory I can expound upon is that of our overly accessible food supply. Just think if all day we, like most all other living creatures on this planet, spent our day seeking food. Seeking food that isn't easily attainable (and I don't mean to lessen the struggle of making money and actually buying food), if all day we hunted and gathered I don't think we would have as much time for petty human-condition type problems. All our emotions would be directed pretty much at the outcome of how our search for food panned out and success would be punctuated with glory and happiness.

Okay, I'm definitely over simplifying matters here. I can attest to the fact that my theory has it's share of holes in it, such as ignoring all the advancements in technology and human ingenuity. Granted. But it's all too often that we hear about people without joy in their lives, our friends, our family, and most frequently those glorified celebrities who are plied with drugs and alcohol and usually call it quits at an age much below average. So where's the joy? Where's the love at? What happened to people really appreciating shit? Like "Goddamn, this bowl of cereal tastes good, maybe I shouldn't take all these horse tranquilizers tonight..." It's hard to really take stock of what you have, instead of trying to find what you're missing. Sometimes it's nice to take a break from something that we all take entirely for granted. To take a step back and truly appreciate something. Just think of how great breathing must feel for the recently asphyxiated.