Thoughts on Change

I was reading somewhere (who knows where, I read so many blogs and magazines and books, I really lose track) Anyways, I read that people’s memory today is appalling compared to those of trained folk in ancient Greek. Then actors, who were not always literate, could recall and declaim verses thousands of lines long. Today, we can barely remember the lyrics to an entire song, but we can find them, with two clicks on our iphone. In Holland, their high school graduates are being tested not on knowledge, but on access. They go into the test with all their computers and gadgets and then are given a topic about which they know nothing, and are timed to research and create a paper/discussion about it. I think that’s what future knowledge is going to be – not memory but access. I look at my son, all of 12, who checks on his phone what rating a restaurant received, and then matches his experience against the Zagat numbers, to see if he agrees or not. No one needs to remember phone numbers any more, we just press contacts and the name pops up. Even with Kindle, (which I just got and love, but more of that another day) my main problem with it is in the recall system – it relies on me remembering a book just by the title - without cover or blurb; and the title is rarely enough for me to remember the book. Sometimes it is, but not a new author, or a series author (I don’t know which Prey book is which, the titles are meaningless to me there.)

 So I think the future is all about knowledge and access. Stories that made sense even 25 years ago, don’t make sense anymore (he moved away so she couldn’t find him.. in today’s world, she could search for 30 mins on google and there he would be) People can aggregate around the weirdest/most poignant issues – read Sufi poets in a Midwestern town of 600? I can find you 600 likeminded friends, only a chat room away. As we become more and more individual in our quirks and needs, we are less and less alone, finding people just like us no matter where we (or they) live.

And I like that. This is change I can live with. You can buy the clothes you like, the books you like, even the food you like (steaks? Marshmallows? And williams Sonoma site will send you the most amazing things) You can find the information you need and the people like you,  and without being limited by geography.

Letting things go

I haven't written for the past two days because I've been searching for the perfect image but I've stopped letting the perfect get in the way of the good, and am writing anyways...



I've been going through my closets which are now as neat as they will ever be, throwing things out. (the above image is clearly fantasy.) I have obeyed my three year rule - I have to wear something once every 3 years, or it can't live in my cupboard anymore, and am so grateful that Housingworks opened a shop around the corner so I can go and give my good enough clothes a new home.

It's funny, how I like throwing things out, it makes me feel lighter and less cluttered in my soul somehow, to have my space leaner and cleaner. Though I don't feel like that about my writing at all, have to keep every scrap there, and don't feel like that about people either. I hate it when people leave.

We are all leaving in my world right now. I've been so affiliated with DS's school, and as he leaves elementary school and moves on to middle school, I can see lots of change and flux.

I realize I'm not a 21st century gal after all. I don't relish change and I don't multi-task well. I like depth and stability. But I also appreciate life cycles and I can see one taking place now, and as change comes, as space forms, new things can grow... So I'm simultaneously trying to let go and hold on... no wonder I can't find the closet picture that portrays that!

Thought for the Day

“You don't get harmony when everybody sings the same note.”*

I guess I'm really feeling pulled in a lot of different directions right now, and striving for harmony, especially with issues around an organization I just joined. I have to say that is a very helpful notion - if we all just agreed, it would be stagnant. Lots of decent people are trying to bring different ideas to the table, all with the fear that if we don't find harmony, things will change. It will all be sound and fury, signifying nothing.

I know what the answer is - things are changing all the time. Noise is part of the melody, we can't all sing the same note, and indeed we ourselves change range as age and other life matters impress upon us. However I still feel anxious. I value this entity and the thought of it changing/going is sad...




*said by someone called Doug Floyd who may or may not be a good person to follow, but I liked this quote.