hopelesshappiness.com

I have had the privilege of 24,062 days in this world. Is it time I grew up and settled down? Probably not…

(Third revision of) Top Forty Albums:

1. Queen - Night at the Opera
2. Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon
3. Led Zeppelin - IV
4. Leonard Cohen - The Essential Leonard Cohen
5. Jimmy Buffett - You Had To Be There
6. Jethro Tull - Aqualung
7. Little Feat - Waiting For Columbus
8. The Band - The Last Waltz
9. Three Dog Night - Seven Separate Fools
10. Elton John - Madman Across the Water
11. Cat Stevens - Teaser and the Firecat
12. The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
13. Soul Asylum - Let Your Dim Light Shine
14. The Who - Who's Greatest Hits 1983
15. Johnny Cash - American IV
16. Collective Soul - Collective Soul
17. Neville Brothers - Live on Planet Earth
18. Rusted Root - Live Disc 2
19. Creedence Clearwater Revival - Chronicle
20. Steve Earle - I Ain't Ever Satisfied
21. Tom Waits - The Early Years Vol. 1
22. Sonia Dada - Sonia Dada
23. The Eagles - Greatest Hits
24. Lynyrd Skynyrd - Pronounced
25. James McMurtry - Complicated Game
26. Old Crow Medicine Show - Old Crow Medicine Show
27. Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - So Far
28. Tom Waits - The Heart of Saturday Night
29. The Clumsy Lovers - Smart Kid
30. Frente! - Marvin the Album
31. Rusted Root -Remember
32. Finn Brothers - Finn
33. Michael Franti - All Rebel Rockers
34. The Badlees - River Songs
35. Doobie Brothers - Best of the Doobies
36. Lyle Lovett - The Road to Ensenada
37. Zac Brown Band - Pass the Jar
38. Eric Clapton - Time Pieces
39. Moby - Play
40. James McMurtry - Saint Mary of the Woods

• Progress: Learning and Growth beneficial to the well-being of both the individual and all of Humanity.
• True Leader: One who works (with at least some success) to direct one or more individuals' energies toward progress.
• Majority: Characterized by comfort-seeking apathy, the majority of us are (in many cases, willingly) held hostage by one or more disruptors.
• Hostage: In addition to the majority, a true leader whose energies are redirected from progress to crowd control.
• Noisy Disruption: Clamorous, strident fear masquerading as order, convention, and certainty.
• Irrelevant Distraction: Noisy Disruption and/or misdirection and/or the more insidious, more silent efforts to sway, make afraid, and/or confuse with arguments for tradition and whispers of conspiracy.
• Disruptor: One who loudly disrupts and/or quietly distracts. One who is at the upper end of comfortable well-being and/or fear. One who is ADAMANTLY and ACTIVELY against change.

We learn at a very young age how a small number of people (often less than 10%) can redirect energy and stymie progress with noisy disruption and irrelevant distraction. And when there is no accountability and there are no consequences for misbehavior, a true leader is no longer a leader, he or she becomes a hostage along with the majority. On occasion a disruptor acquires a position of leadership; a disruptor is never a true leader. Progress requires change. A disruptor acquires leadership when change is scary, cumbersome or merely inconvenient. It seems a majority of us would prefer convenient ignorance over scary (necessary) progress. And we learn this at a very young age.

As early as kindergarten a disruptor can be identified and should be separated for more individualized attention. Perhaps a separate classroom with a significantly lower student-to-teacher ratio and instead of an open classroom, one with partitioned cubicles. A second open classroom can be nearby and socialization used as a reward for learning and progress.

Regarding any stigma that may be associated with cubicles as classroom, current practice dictates safe seats, learning interventions, administrative discipline, walking laps, shortened or no recess, and a consistent barrage of (often loud) staff and teacher invective and diatribe, so the potential for stigma is already present. I believe possible stigma associated with partitions as crowd control would not only be less but is more than justified by more individualized learning and greater, more efficient progress. Efficiencies can be gained with little or no additional resources by simply moving current staff, (aides, paraprofessionals, and specialists) to fewer classrooms working alongside one or more certified teachers for each grade represented. In addition the classrooms could be fluid moving students back and forth as dictated by behavior and assessed by behavior specialists.

I believe education to be Humanity's best shot at survival and I believe it is too late for this premise to be applied to the apathetic, conveniently ignorant majority of adults in this country. That said, if the wealthy would pay their fair share we could apply the partition plan to adult disruptors by rounding up the most vocal and paying them handsomely to stay out of the way with meaningful busy work; and it could be meaningful as an aid for understanding their fear and anger and disillusionment. Perhaps then we could not only educate the very young but we could do so in a way that encourages active contribution instead of our current state of apathy and discontent.

Perhaps it is not too late.

I am writing a Cookbook, and in recent weeks that is where my creative / learning energies have been directed, thus another list below.

(Second revision of) Top Forty Albums:

1. Queen - Night at the Opera
2. Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon
3. Led Zeppelin - IV
4. Leonard Cohen - The Essential Leonard Cohen
5. Jimmy Buffett - You Had To Be There
6. Jethro Tull - Aqualung
7. Little Feat - Waiting For Columbus
8. The Band - The Last Waltz
9. Three Dog Night - Seven Separate Fools
10. Elton John - Madman Across the Water
11. Cat Stevens - Teaser and the Firecat
12. The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
13. Johnny Cash - American IV
14. Collective Soul - Collective Soul
15. Neville Brothers - Live on Planet Earth
16. Rusted Root - Live
17. Creedence Clearwater Revival - Chronicle
18. Steve Earle - I Ain't Ever Satisfied
19. Tom Waits - The Early Years Vol. 1
20. Sonia Dada - Sonia Dada
21. The Eagles - Greatest Hits
22. Lynyrd Skynyrd - Pronounced
23. James McMurtry - Complicated Game
24. Old Crow Medicine Show - Old Crow Medicine Show
25. Tom Waits - The Heart of Saturday Night
26. Rusted Root -Remember
27. Finn Brothers - Finn
28. The Badlees - River Songs
29. The Who - Greatest Hits
30. Doobie Brothers - Best of the Doobies
31. Soul Asylum - Let Your Dim Light Shine
32. Lyle Lovett - The Road to Ensenada
33. Zac Brown Band - Pass the Jar
34. Eric Clapton - Time Pieces
35. The Clumsy Lovers - Smart Kid
36. Frente! - Marvin the Album
37. The Rolling Stones - Some Girls
38. Billy Joel - Piano Man
39. James McMurtry - Saint Mary of the Woods
40. Michael Franti - All Rebel Rockers

• 8/2/25 Cookbook
• 3/15/25 Structured Chaos
• 7/5/25 Head Heart Hips
• 5/31/25 Food and Music
• 3/22/25 How to Ignore the World
• 5/24/25 White Flag
• 7/19/25 Soggy
• 8/9/25 Touchstones
• 10/12/24 Touching Reality
• 2/22/25 Upside the Head
• 9/21/24 Conversations
• 2/15/25 Move 37
• 7/1/23 Artificial Happiness
• 10/19/24 entitled justice
• 11/16/24 Humanitarian… Citizen… Pretender…
• 10/4/25 Cubicles as Classroom
• 10/1/11 Recipe for Happiness
• 5/7/22 Indulging Happiness
• 5/14/22 Happiness. My God.
• 4/23/22 Happiness: Considerations