I been sitting out here on the porch putting some thought to the whole thing, and I reckon I have it figured as well as the next fella.

See, the thing about rays is that their is always gonna be a ray to take a ray's place. Rays are a constant in this life, as they will be in the next. Jesus chased the rays out of the temple way back when, and now Congress is stacked to the roof with them. The key is that one ray is not always as bad as another. As bad as the ray you have is, there is another ray that is worse waiting in the wings. And the ray before the one you have was likely a doozy too.

Picture a highway. You are driving along, minding your own business when a ray slides in behind you. What should you do? The idea is that you want to think like a ray, and anticipate what it could possibly do. That's not a great plan. Things like rays have starfish brains. They only react to the waves washing over their spindly arms. No greater idea has ever come to a ray about why they sit on the bottom of the ocean, or how the sea flows. Rays react to stimuli as an ameoba would, waggling psuedopods with no malice, just determination, no goal, just muscle action. Rays always have a surprise for you. They are the year round Secret Santa, lying in wait like a cop behind a billboard, or a censor reading your mail. It is the nature of the ray.

How can you stop the ray? How can you build a fortess against it?

The trick is to not become a ray. It is a slippery slope, greased well by the backsides of men that didn't understand that the ray is not a thing, or a state of unhealthiness, but instead a force of nature. Being ray is not a lifestyle choice. Rays are born ray, and they cannot be anything other than the Ray-hearted rays that they are.

Rays are immutable, and yet, not always rays. The state of a ray is a state of flux. A ray may be streaking toward one place, only to become something else, something not raylike. A particule of something that is maybe filled with hope, or potential for a non-determined state, a non-rayian body. A changed ray, non aligned with the others around it is lost. A ray divided cannot stand against itself. An island in a stream of rays may have once been a ray. A ray that has cast off its shackles of rayhood may become something other, something whole and bright, or it may burn a fade like a cinder. Rays are change, and change is ray.

Can you beat the ray? I would rather answer if you could beat the sun from the sky!

See, the thing about rays is that they are soft. They don't take rays out behind the shed any more, and they don't lock them up like they used to. Is this progress? Can rays be expected to live among those that are not ray? Should rays be allowed to be a part of all of our lives? Segregation did nothing to ease rays into society. Some fought long and hard to give rays a fair shake, like that was possible. All are not equal in the eyes of ray.

No, I can't cotton to no rays. And yet, people like me have been towing the line for rays since the day I was born, and they are going to keep doing it till the day I die. You can't hide your head in the sand and groupthink rays aren't gonna pop up on you. If I had a nickle for every ray that crawled up and spoiled my day, I'd be a rich man. No, you can't stop a ray.

So, the trick to beating a ray is to catch them off guard. They aren't too fast, and they usually don't look behind them. You can get the drop on them if you stay up wind, and keep low to the ground. I have a hefty hardwood bat (Sugar Maple, if you're looking to buy one) that I keep round, just for rays. They say the only good ray is a dead ray, but I say the only good ray is one that you see coming.

Thats what 'they' say. But hey, they maybe a ray. Ya' never know.



for IWhoSawTheFace, a ray if I ever saw one.