The empty vase makes the loudest noise

My dad has this phrase, probably an East Coast colloquialism, about the empty vase making the loudest noise. And I was thinking about that in conjunction with the U.S. incarceration rate. The U.S. proclaims itself to be the Land of the Free, but it has the highest incarceration rate in the world, save the few dictatorships that don't event report rates. 1in 100 people in the U.S. is currently behind bars. That statistic is so frightening, especially combined with our massive military spending. The entire country exist in a state of paranoid fear that something horrible is just about to happen, and is willing to spend billions of dollars to try to prevent it. So this is not the land of the free, this is the land of fear.

But that isn't what any of the country western songs blaring on the radio will tell you.

I would think sophisticated, politically savvy people would know this, that the more people talk about something, the less and less true it becomes. Words have a way of swallowing up meaning, especially if there is no action to back it up.

I can proclaim until the cows come home that I love someone, but if I've never even kissed them, it's all just echoes in an empty bottle.

Luckily, growing up down the street from Disneyland made me want to seek out the real and natural and messy in life.

Unfortunately, too many other people get its a small world stuck in their heads, and never snap out of it.