A Stones Throw Away

Trying to keep the ball rolling.
Don't want to feel like Sisyphus rolling the stone up the mountain just to chase it back down again. Or even Wilbur Mercer, for that matter.

I remember reading 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?' on a plane to Reno, NV in 2008(?).
I am pretty sure I didn't finish it during the flight. I get pretty sleepy on a plane/bus/car/whatever when I'm not the one driving(I was known on the school bus as the 'kid who sleeps').
But I do remember reading it then. I may have even finished it that trip.

Right after the plane landed an ice storm hit the area and the roads were quickly covered in a sheet of ice.
It was like that the whole week, I remember that clearly enough.

I had been to Reno a few times before, and this was weird because there were so few people out. Because of the weather.

I was there with a friend and coworker that had just hired on a few months prior to this trip. We hit a couple of casinos while we were out. I remember playing video poker and getting watered down drinks at one of the bars.

It was dystopic. Fallout 3: New Vegas comes to mind now.
It may have been the best time to be in Reno. It was memorable.

I can't recall if that was my first PKD book. I know it wasn't my last. I'm still working my way through the bibliography.
It takes a lot out of a person to read one of his books. There's a lot of 'head' stuff to consider.

Dick and Kurt Vonnegut are two of my favorite authors (I know, so original). But their writings, Vonnegut's in a less "I'm so confused; nothing is real" way, both work to break down the cultural walls that we've been building around ourselves since we emerged in this world.

Each of us is the tip of a pyramid that consists of all of our own experiences and influences, coupled with the influence of everyone and everything we come in contact with and their pyramid of experiences and influences.
This goes back forever. :)

There is no 'you' or 'me'. What is that?
What we think of as these pronouns are just veneer and coats of paint layered on day after day, life after life.

It's what is underneath the dirt and grime, glitter and gold that we want to find.
We search so hard, and it's right there, just underneath: our true nature.

This is the part of us that connects us all. The thing we share. The constant.
The empathy box in "...Androids..." taps into that.

The shared experience.

The veneer of life, the shell that is "I" and "me" makes us forget that we are mutually here. Mutually existing.

Who is throwing the stones?

The Buddha.