Senior Immunity

One might think that Players in the Last Quarter have earned a degree of immunity to the sillinesses that infect early life. Like many Players, I watch ... hell! When we're not in our Cialis claw-footed tubs with our much younger spouses, we must be observing the World and sharing our wisdom -- like Wise Ole King Soloman in Proverbs or Ecclesiastes -- with those younger and not so "in on the secrets" as we. ............ But like many other Players in the Fourth Quarter, I've been participating in listservs and discussion boards since about the time the Twin Towers came down, killing thousands, disturbing the tranquility of many families in the USA just as families in other war-torn countries have experienced forever, and leaving many feeling isolated and disconnected. I sought these online groups expecting friendly love and the affection that accrues to people who are members of groups. Church, Mosque and Synagogue have been infected by the rampant distrust that has grown in our lifetimes and the internet held out a last great hope. ........ Instead of love and affection, though, we found it all in cyberspace: Love, Hate and Indifference. .... It was just about 100 years ago that a Dokteur from Vienna offered up a fairy tale which he told one of his students -- tongue in cheek, maybe -- that he thought up on a rainy Sunday afternoon. ...... He thought that ages ago, people lived in Hordes that were dominated by a single male who held control over all the women while keeping the kids in check. One day, however, the kids, tired of being shoved about like pawns on a chessboard or prawn on a plate, rose up and killed and cannibalized Papa and created rituals to cover their deed. .... What the Good Dokteur never considered, however, was that what changed, perchance, was not predominantly the overthrow of Papa but the understanding of the power of grouping and subgrouping. ..... In any case, online groups may have all the stuff of these Primal Hordes. People gather and avow themselves of the comfort of subgrouping. It takes the form in cybergroups of flare-ups .... of subgroups gathering into units to make war on singleton others or on other subgroups.In one group I'm in, a fellow from Chicago has been identified as a right-wing-whack-job ... another as being inscrutable, that is, ununderstandable. A third was identified as hostile and driven out. All of these folk --Identified odd ones and Identifiers, alike are Players at least in the Last Half ... most in the Last Quarter. ...... ...... ..... In schools, this subgrouping seems to take the form of bullying, of choosing to excommunicate and torture or identify-as-odd-and-alien certain individuals (again, bullying) or subgroups. But Old Farts are not immune to the same torments and flare-ups, or at least, that's the way it seems to this Oldster ... at least, today. ......... BTW, I did go to hear that talk, yesterday, and my student present. I stayed for more than half and didn't leave till after lunch. Players in the Last Quarter may flare up like the rest of the folk but they rarely leave without eating lunch.