The Urban King and Princess Proud have adopted every techno craze to
vastly expand their edge on everyone else. While older members continue
to lament the days of the Victrola or maybe the LP, the young lions are
trading in their old Ipods to upgrade to higher memory items. Their
self-indulgence is evident by their trademark spaghetti ears as
wires hang down their throat and into their pocket. I wonder what they
are listening to and if they can hear that truck approaching or the beggar
on the street moving his lips.
There is nothing wrong, other than the missed opportunity to hear
something other than a digital tone. Yes, I like to sit out in the woods,
with no lights around, and stare at the stars. How big they are, even
bigger still, if you're looking at them from the veranda of an equatorial
nation.
And then there are the hands glued to the ear and that distant look or
rapid chatter as the cellular phone frequencies vibrate without stopping.
I have been able to count ten passing pedestrians in a row, without
exception, with hand to ear, engaged in something so desperately important
that I think the safety of our Universe depends upon it. The more
important they are, the more chances they take. They can drive with one
hand and still cram the clam against the ear while they navigate the
streets, and usually not very well. That was a white line you pulled
over, and now the pedestrians must detour into traffic, because you are
too inconsiderate to pull back, even though you have plenty of room.
If I am to be nasty, then my only pleasure is to realize that to get to
this point, you probably had to max out your Credit Card, dose up with a
gallon of caffeine, and be oblivious to what is looming on the horizon in
your future. They will be called panic attacks, though they could come as
unexplainable dizziness, slightly elevated blood pressure, a tendency
toward the new epidemic of Diabetes, and higher than normal levels of
everything from mercury to cadmium to aluminum.
You are doomed to become that overweight jockey stuffed into an electric
wheelchair, not because you need the wheelchair, but because it's easier
to get around. Every so often, we see you get up and out and lumber
toward the cashier to pay her for that cholesterol-soaked hamburger and
then to light up a cigarette. You are too far gone to change, even if you
wanted to.
So it's back to the laptop. You're using it now. Back to the quick
shoot-em-up game, which you know just makes your brainwaves race. And
there is a very good reason for it all. You know you are an extension of
those people you see in the movies who are always cutting it close. They
race through the streets, barely missing everything in sight, rocket up
the ramp to leap the gap and land on the ferry, which, just before it
explodes, gives you enough time to crawl from the window, and dive
overboard where a passing speedboat lays a rope in your hand, and sweeps you
up onto the shore.
You have your circle of friends whose lives and intrigues artificially
rival any bubblehead celebrity or reality artifice, and to you and to them,
it is all the center of whatever exists and whatever will exist.
Those old codgers creeping along the street will never be you. You can't
imagine how or why they chose that life. Body parts have ceased to
function, libido is gone, there's a constant trail of gas lingering in
clothing folds, and lumps have grown every which way, to the point where
you know they could never be hired to advertise anything other than
hemorrhoid cream or denture adhesive.
There is only one problem with the entire package. You just don't get it.
You are not that important, your life is insignificant, and you are
decaying faster than all prior generations. You will be deaf and toxic
far more quickly because you haven't got the time to relax, meditate, and
detoxify. The future is inevitable. All current events, unpleasant wars,
and intense political attitudes, will squeeze into forgotten mush like
last year's snowfall. They will be replaced by much the same thing for
the next heroic crew, but you won't be one of them. You'll be the
next Hemorrhoid Poster Boy.
Pause. Turn off the cell phone. Take a deep breath. Now and then, look
up to the stars and listen to voices in the wind.
