When It Rains in The Dump

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Cutting a Swath Through the Landfill

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Coming to Honduras

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The other day in philosophy class I was teaching about existentialism, a philosophy with which I have myriad problems. The universe is absurd, life is meaningless, authenticate yourself with irrational leaps of faith! Hopeless and disconnected from reality if you ask me. Get out of the café Camus, mix with some common folk! Nevertheless, as I was introducing the material I mentioned that the existentialists really probed the questions of Life's meaning and purpose: "How do I create myself to be unique and significant?" "How do I live an authentic existence?" "How do I give my life meaning and purpose in an otherwise meaningless universe?" These seem to be questions that are attendant to societies that possess extreme wealth and privilege and an over-abundance of leisure time. I have serious doubts that 15th Century English peasants or even nobles for that matter, spent much time contemplating how they might make their lives unique or leave a...
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It's been far too long since last I've written and while there's been much that I've wanted to say and comment on, I've found my ability to articulate these thoughts to be wanting. My old knack for putting finger to keyboard and unloading my missives in a coherent way seems to have dissipated over these past few months. It's not been for lack of inspiration; there's much within the culture that has me frustrated and much here in La Ceiba that has me either pensive or overjoyed. For whatever reason though that perhaps God only knows, I've found that every time I've sat down to write nothing has come - I've barely even had the desire to try. William Nickols though, my feckless and jovial gadfly of a student has been relentless these many months pestering me to write a new post and always I've swatted him away hoping to avoid his reproaches. Today though on the Facebook I decided I'd had enough; I decided that I'm tired of silence, tired...
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