COMARADERIE

Two times in my life I was a part of something bigger, something vaster, than just myself.

First was when we were smoking and reading each others' works in the earned first light of morning as we kept the night for daytime and daily slept through the sun. All the knowledge of everything that could be learned swept round me, an ocean I dreamed to drown in. If only I had had the money...the material wealth to live the life immaterial.

Second was a circle of comrades, all the same hair style, all the same clothes. We followed the plan each day from dawn to dark and then more and more again. We were proud to be one, honored to carry out the orders we dared not contemplate for fear of being crushed in our own guilt, in our own shame.