I know people who are pursuing alternatives to living by rote and in ease, don't you? You could be more hopeful but I can't argue with your diagnoses of society's ills. Thanks for your thoughtful writing.
Part of my joy at getting lost was stumbling along a learning curve. Back in the pre-Navigation Era, I craved the excitement of engaging with maps to generally locate small towns, then major streets, followed by neighborhoods and then discovering shortcuts to a destination. Maybe that’s like you and your writing Tom. The journey itself can be a pleasure and when the trip loses all sense of struggle, it becomes an empty endeavor.
True dat. And the past ain’t current. Michael Crichton wrote a book “Timeline” (1999) the thrust of which involves time travel back to the 1300s. The main character is plopped down into an English village where he is confronted by a very physically fit knight, with whom he has a sword fight. He describes how these people seven hundred years ago were strong from constant manual labor and physical training, and that he could feel himself wane in the face of such rustic power. They say that men’s testosterone levels are in free fall from just a short while ago. I am not ashamed to say that I am not the man my grandfather was, but neither am I proud of it. One more example of Modernity hollowing out the Species. My theory? Recall Dustin Hoffman, sunglassed and floating in the pool (“The Graduate”), and down flutters the word of the Age: PLASTICS.
I know people who are pursuing alternatives to living by rote and in ease, don't you? You could be more hopeful but I can't argue with your diagnoses of society's ills. Thanks for your thoughtful writing.
I’m trying my best, but I continually find myself getting pulled back into the frenetic rat race!
So, so you think you can tell
Heaven from Hell
blue skies from pain
Can you tell a green field
from a cold steel rail?
A smile from a veil?
Do you think you can tell?
And did they get you to trade
your heroes for ghosts?
Hot ashes for trees?
Hot air for a cool breeze?
Cold comfort for change?
And did you exchange
a walk on part in the war
for a lead role in a cage?
Modernity offers convenience, efficiency, economic growth, and nothing else.
This is true.
Part of my joy at getting lost was stumbling along a learning curve. Back in the pre-Navigation Era, I craved the excitement of engaging with maps to generally locate small towns, then major streets, followed by neighborhoods and then discovering shortcuts to a destination. Maybe that’s like you and your writing Tom. The journey itself can be a pleasure and when the trip loses all sense of struggle, it becomes an empty endeavor.
Amen. “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
True dat. And the past ain’t current. Michael Crichton wrote a book “Timeline” (1999) the thrust of which involves time travel back to the 1300s. The main character is plopped down into an English village where he is confronted by a very physically fit knight, with whom he has a sword fight. He describes how these people seven hundred years ago were strong from constant manual labor and physical training, and that he could feel himself wane in the face of such rustic power. They say that men’s testosterone levels are in free fall from just a short while ago. I am not ashamed to say that I am not the man my grandfather was, but neither am I proud of it. One more example of Modernity hollowing out the Species. My theory? Recall Dustin Hoffman, sunglassed and floating in the pool (“The Graduate”), and down flutters the word of the Age: PLASTICS.