Chris Herrington, Contributing Writer
Or isn’t it really just the revised version of the way it always is? This is why we need a savings account. This is why we need better boundaries. This is why we need to have a speed bump, insurance, a bumper, a second car, an extra bedroom or at least a couch, and the myriad things that we don’t use all the time but just in case we need them we have them.
I do not like having to pay for insurance. I have to admit though, when you need it, it more than makes up for itself. I recently had surgery and my insurance company did me right. Being in the hospital can cost from $1000 to $3000 per hour or more. I know that that is insane, but if you think about it, it makes better sense if you have good insurance. Without insurance, those numbers are intergalactic. Insurance: Don’t leave home without it.
A helmet, a safety belt, braces, shoes, harnesses, protection of any kind, when you need it, there is nothing like it. It’s like consciousness. When you need to be sober, you really need to be sober. Facing a policeman who is investigating your accident, you really want to be sober. I know that people will say that being drunk saved their lives because it made them limp enough to survive the impact, but that does not mitigate the cause of the accident in the first place.
An education is irreplaceable at the moment when you need it. I love this line by Black Elk, “No one is so difficult to teach as a man who has a Ph.D. from Harvard. I really hear that; a classical training can in fact rip the creativity right out of you. Studies show that the more institutionalized the education, the more profoundly the person is likely to be intolerant and narrow-minded in his or her focus and perceptions. If you are a hammer looking of a nail, that is all you are going to see. If Dr. House and MacGyver have taught us anything, it is to think outside the box. For sure. But, an education is that which is brought out from inside of you, not what is shoved into you as facts and dates and names. Learning to think for yourself and on your feet is invaluable.
Knowing the rules so that you can break the rules is an important aspect of modern life. You know what most people are going to do. Knowing that allows you to make decisions that are more than simply educated guesses. We know that people can start new adventures and become addicted to them, consumed by them, drawn in to the detriment of everything else. We say things like, “Where did Chris go? He seems to have disappeared!” He’s busy on his new hobby, his new collection, his new obsession, his next great idea. The next version of that video game came out and he is gone. Football widows.
We can think of this process of death and destruction as a series of fascinations gone viral in our heads. Evil Baby!!!!!! Give’em the evil eye….. Bah-yahhhhhh! Oh, yeah, I have seen that about 50 times….really funny…yeah, saw the piano and cat thing…yep. Bird and cat, yep….
Okay, so what about all the stuff we used to do before the Internet? What about before the phone? What about before homeownership? Before agriculture? Every time we meet up with someone who wants to hold on to an old technology we think, “Give it up, Buddy!” This is how the world is. Capitalism even touts destruction as a creative process. Even capitalism itself is transforming. We think of human beings as being fixed, but so much for the incredible shrinking little toe and the non-necessary spleen. We are getting bigger and our technology is getting more complex. Those who are not able to survive will be vanishing strands of human genes, and those who are nerding it up will excel.
What did humanity do before all of this? That is history. What will we do with it in the future? That remains to be seen. For sure, we will abandon some things, like traditions and assumptions, and we will continue on into the bright light of technology and scientific wisdom. Will Christ become the new Dionysus, that last of the Greek gods? Will religion be replaced with the new narratives of technology and advertising? What will we do with all the time we used to spend on our fellow man? Will we focus more on consuming the icons of brand name ideological iconographies which are the new baselines of loyalty and economic traction? What did you do before you discovered fast food? What did you do before gaming? Do you ever even remember a day without TV? What will we become without our humanity? Will that too slip off into the night, our standing like Neo on the train station platform waiting for a train that will never arrive? Cyber Christ? The real Final Fantasy? The end of science. The ultimate answer to a unified field theory? The basic components of matter? The meaning of life? Is it “42?” At 59, I hardly think so.
runningturtle87
