Just nod if you can hear me

...it's my first rodeo? What if it's my last time around?

Who'll be my role model now that my role model is gone?

if you don't know this one:

In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of every glove that laid him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
"I am leaving, I am leaving"
But the fighter still remains

... it is a bit old and maybe a bit obscure but if you know it and don't feel something when the bass kicks in on the
Lie-la-lie
Lie-la-lie-lie-lie-lie-lie
Lie-la-lie
Lie-la-lie-lie-lie-lie-lie, lie-lie-lie-lie-lie

Then we probably won't be friends after all.

If you can't hear this voice and this organ when you read this:

Dearly beloved, we have gathered here today
To get through this thing called life
Electric word life, it means forever and that's a mighty long time
But I'm here to tell you, there's something else
The afterworld, a world of never ending happiness
You can always see the sun, day or night
So when you call up that shrink in Beverly Hills
You know the one, Dr. Everything'll Be Alright
Instead of asking him how much of your time is left?
Ask him how much of your mind, baby
'Cause in this life things are much harder than in the afterworld
This life you're on your own
And if de-elevator tries to bring you down
Go crazy, punch a higher floor

...we're probably not going to be friends.

Why are we, at least in the states, continually asking, "How are you?" or any of the myriad variations? And why are we continually answering, "OK"?

You don't want to know and I don't want to say. 

I've recently started answering OK - ish and the look of horror / or dead air on the phone is palpable. "You've broken the ritual!" "How do I respond!" "Will I have to interact with another human beyond my prescribed, scripted routine!"

I am OK - ish. I'm not to the level of the starving, broken, dead-eyed, fly covered kids that the "Christians" trot out for the holidays every year and run on late night commercials in heavy rotation to try to guilt us into forking over some of our fortune that we had earmarked for a last festive celebration before the long three month slog towards spring to put toward their own twisted OG pyramid scheme. I'm also not to the level of the ribs-out, mud-covered, puppy-mill rejects that Sarah Mclachlan insists on singing over ad infinitum during the afternoon talk-shows. (By the way, there is a shelter in you back yard. Take them a case of cat/dog wet food or a big old bag o' dry and old linens you are not using. The look on the workers faces will tell you you've made much more of a contribution than your "less than a cup of coffee" donation to a multinational money gobbler.)

So yeah, I'm OK ish. I'm fighting a daily struggle with physical, emotional and psychological pain but I'm guessing you are too. Some days it's a miasma in a quagmire of a riddle wrapped in an enigma (OK, most days). ...and so it goes.

So why do we ask? And oh, the horrors when someone actually answers!!! That's 20 minutes of your life you will never get back but at least you learned never to ask that person again!

So why do we ask? Is it just the self-soothing purr of a nervous cat? If they say OK, am I OK too, by proximity or osmosis or the transitive laws of geometry? If they say OK, do I not have to acknowledge the inequities between us and the growing cracks in what we humorously call society? If they are obviously not OK but they say it, does it make it more OK, because if they are obviously fucked up but they can say they are OK does that make my not OK even more OK?

“Life is pain, highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”

― William Goldman

Or as some fat dead Asian said a while back: Life is suffering and we all know it, so if you must ask, (and I know that you must) everything is OK, I'm fine, and you are too.