The theme of corporate stories (and millions drink them in every day) seldom varies: to be happy you must consume, to be special you must conform. Absurd, obviously, yet our identities have become so fragile, so elusive, that we seem content to let advertisers provide us with their version of who we are, to let them recreate us in their image: a cookie-cutter image based on market research, shallow sociology, and insidious lies.

Using words to describe magic is like using a screwdriver to cut roast beef.

Are you aware that rushing toward a goal is a sublimated death wish? It's no coincidence we call them 'deadlines.'

She continued weeping until the heat of her tear water, the sheer velocity of its flow, finally obscured the already vague circumstances of its origins.

You're better equipped for this world than I am," she said. "I'm always trying to change the world. You know how to live in it.

As long as a population can be induced to believe in a supernatural hereafter, it can be oppressed and controlled. People will put up with all sorts of tyranny, poverty, and painful treatment if they're convinced that they'll eventually escape to some resort in the sky where lifeguards are superfluous and the pool never closes. Moreover, the faithful are usually willing to risk their skins in whatever military adventure their government may currently be promoting.

Society in general maintains such a vested interested in its cozy habits and solidified belief systems that it had rather die - or kill - than entertain change. Consider how threatened religious fundamentalists of all faiths remain to this day by science in general and Darwin in particular.