Friends With Benefits

"Friends with benefits" is a prominent entry in the dictionary of urban legendary. It's the ultimate albeit quotidian expression of transactional behavior, pleasure being the lingua franca of barter and exchange. Trump's The Art of the Deal is the Gideon Bible of a universe where the calling of Saint Francis with its abrogation of materialism is an increasingly faint barely audible whisper. Barter is actually an ancient profession that precedes currency. Lewis Hyde has related these kinds of economics in his concept of "the gift," which is a non-reciprocal form of exchange. Generosity and benevolence in this paradigm are tantamount to toolmaking in the advent of consciousness. What's so singular about the current Ice Age of sensibility is that it brooks no past. The president conveys a delusory reassurance in his incantations about tariffs. It's as if you no longer remember a world where there was anything else.

read "Pet Buddha" by Francis Levy, Vol. 1 Brooklyn

listen to James Brown and Luciano Pavarotti singing "It's a Man's World"

and listen to "I Love to Love (But My Baby Just Wants to Dance)" by Tina Charles (1975)

and listen to "Band of Gold" by Freda Payne with Belinda Carlisle

and listen to "Twenty-Five Miles From Home" by Edwin Starr