Answers

They say, if you want to write, then you should start writing.

Sounds sorta silly, to me. But then again, there is truth to it.

If you do not start writing, then you'll never have written anything. Which, really, is a shorter way of saying what you'd be saying if you just started writing but had nothing meaningful to say.

Which, really, is what I am doing here.

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Since i have started writing, finally, I thought about something that bears discussion. Although you, the reader, may find this topic tedious, it really does have some thread of ... ummm.... seriousness in it, no matter how thin the thread.

A lot of years ago, when I was a teenager, I started reading a book. It sounded pretty good by the title, but I had never read anything of the sort before. It was The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy. In it, Douglas Adams (also a writer for Monty Python, coincidentally) started a trilogy of books, that finally grew into a set of 5, even though a trilogy is only 3. In my youth, I only ever read the first three.

They were very formative for me... by the end of those stories, I learned, according to Adams, that the answer to the question of life is... "42". So then they had to figure out exactly what the 'question of life' is.... Come to find out, it was something along the lines of "What is 9 times 6?

Which, as we all know, is not 42. There was a flaw in the calculations, apparently.

Skipping ahead quite a few years....

As an adult... I decided to go back and re-read the books, and finally finish up by reading the last two books of the five book trilogy. There were misadventures galore, and by the fifth book, I was wanting to know exactly how this was going to end. Did the main character(s) find peace and happiness? Did they learn the true answer and question?

Well... not to spoil the ending for any of you who have not read but do intend to someday read this series of books, but.. (so if you intend to read it, please do not continue reading this)... but.... I was disgusted by the ending. I threw the book down in anger. How could that stupid-head write such an ending to the series and then go off to his corner and die????

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I have learned, actually deduced back while I was still young and smart, that the true answer to the question of life is not 42, but rather, as everyone should know, fifteen. Yes, 15. Actually it is quite a good answer to any question. If you say, "What, my son, is the answer to 4 times 2, and he answers 8, you can correct him. Obviously, to a simple mind, 8 would appear to be the answer. But, in reality, it is 15.

How far is the distance between the Sun and Earth. Why, 15, of course. and so on....

It now escapes me why it is that 15 is such a wonderful answer to all that ails us. But, I am positive that it is a good answer. And even Mr. Adams' ending to his series of books, has a happy ending after all. Because despite the awfulness of that writing, I am consoled that there was good that came of it. Because no matter what, I know... the answer to the question of life.