FROM TREASURE ISLAND TO WHOREHOUSE

Introducing this week's latest confluence-of-dots....! You know, those little and large pieces of history which float around your attention span begging to be connected. And daring some fool writer to try.

Here they be: November is the 160th anniversary of the birth of Robert Louis Stevenson...also the month the Keith Richards autobiography is published...the Pew Opinion Center reports that the Millennial Generation (1981-2000) is the most open minded in history...and the latest batch of secret documents is revealed about US aid to ex-Nazis after WWII.

Here's how to make these disparate dots fit.

Stevenson is among the 30 most-translated authors in all the world. In my own experience, his "Treasure Island," "Kidnapped," and "Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde" opened my adolescent mind to a galaxy of fascinating fictional characters who lived by enormous appetites and ambitions. Villains, yes, but mostly heroes. And great heroes have always been the food of future greatness.

At the same time, we are told that this generation is far more tolerant and open to others. Which is in itself a good thing. And yet, if you live in a world where everyone is equally tolerable and tolerated, where are your exceptions to the norm? your great heroes and heroines? your shining horizons?

Well, Keith Richards may fill that bill for some. After all, he is the current personification of all things wild and bold and distinct. Perhaps, then, a great anti-hero? Well, yes, at least that. Nothing pure and paper-maiche about him like past heroes such as Notre Dame's Gipper, flight's Lindbergh, fiction's Tom Sawyer, Frank Merriwether, Jack Armstrong, Rocky and Captain Kirk.

In defense (or explanation) of the tolerant Millennials, it's hard to have heroes when your nation's capitol is a whorehouse of exposed secret documents. Each one another expose of how our heroes behaved badly. During our wars, our peace, and every year in between!

We are told -- by our Bikers, Libertarians, and other assorted Existentialists -- that it's time America and Americans grow up. Bite the bullet of history. Realize we are not the city on the shining hill populated with Hallmark heroes and heroines. No argument. But to today's blooming Millennials, a thought...

Humanity, even you, do not live by bread alone. There are times when we all need some desserts to look to and hunger after!