Philip stands and explains something I cannot for the Life of me get my head around. The words bob and weave from Biblical eschatology to occult lore to demonology to seventies and eighties rock. When he turns up at the coffee shop out of sheer politeness I ask him questions about himself, his health, his day, and inevitably bring down this sort of bilge upon my head. As with a great many people trapped in a labyrinthian maze of half baked ideas he has an existential need to get things off his chest, or out of his head you might also say. 

  Wherever he goes he always has a grocery bag full of books he’s picked up at the local thrift store with him. After sitting down and before ordering his coffee he hauls out his various purchases and proceeds to carefully remove the price sticker from each with a nail of his finger. 

  I know enough not to get him going on politics of course. As with most people I meet that’s an absolute given. 

  But his meandering explication today has terminated with a question I gather. He is standing over me apparently expecting an answer. 

  “Huh? What?” I ask, having largely tuned him out by this time. 

“What has this Campbell fella to say about UFOs, does he believe in them?” he asks again. He saw me reading Creative Mythology one day and by way of rekindling my interest in conversation tries to draw Campbell into the discussion now and then. 

  “Ya, no, Campbell doesn’t mention space aliens I’m afraid. Or not that I know of.” I don’t mention Campbell’s slim volume The Inner Reaches Of Outer Space for fear of muddying the conversational water even more. 

  Finally the chat loses steam and Phil sits down and starts fiddling with his phone. 

  How can I explain a simplicity I see and feel nowadays, a simplicity and a sense that we have overcomplicated things in our headlong rush for knowledge and ‘understanding?’

  How can I communicate to others who are wrapped up in the complexities of modern citified existence that when I say life is all there is I really mean…

  Life is ALL there is!