Subprime Beyond the Pale

I look at all these hundreds of homes burning out in California, and wonder, along with pondering the subprime crisis:

Do all things ultimately just balance out -- however painfully and tragically it appears to us?

(I myself am subpar, below prime, beyond the pale.)

Anatomy of 'Albatross'

Of course, the title of this blog borrows from a metaphor popularized by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in his mysterious Rime of the Ancient Mariner poem (1798). Several authors have played with the notion of the albatross's power, its curse, its burden.

The origin of the word is diver.

We dive for diverse riches, for the pearl of our dreams.

It can weigh us down, but oftentimes not like an anchor. More like a millstone.

In writing about the acquisitiveness of others, I do not imply that I am exempt from this attachment and reaching. I am not exempt. At all.

Coleridge wrote:

Water, water, everywhere,

Nor any drop to drink

to describe the sailors adrift at sea, starving and parched amid a sea of water.

I suppose our society could readily substitute the word money for water in the passage above.

Or a myriad of other words symbolizing the shiny bauble of Glamour or Greed.