Modern life has overtaken life
If everything broke the right way, you’re reading this and I’m somewhere in Costa Rica. (Note to potential thieves: Please do not ransack. You’re not finding anything. Pretty sure the most expensive item in the house is the damn couch my wife insisted on buying, not that I’m bitter about it. I keep the loose change in an old Werther’s original tin on the bookshelf in my room. Help yourself. Anyway …)
Anyway, I’m in Costa Rica. And if things really broke the right way, I won’t know about the kid missing in Wyoming, or the threat of war in Kashmir, or the nuke that exploded over Moscow, or who the second string running back is for the Cowboys, or what you just posted on Facebook.
Yep. I will be - as I always do when I go on vacation - unplugged. Completely. Phone off, TV off, newspapers gone, you name it, I’m tuning it out.
It is the best part of vacation for me.
Of course, I can choose to do this all the time. I don’t need to go on vacation from the world to go on vacation from the world. Except … I can’t, not if I want to continue eating and paying the bills. My job(s) demand I stay in tune with the world. (My hobbies demand I stay in tune with who the second string running back is for the Cowboys.) I cannot disconnect.
Now granted - I don’t break bricks for a living. Writing and talking isn’t exactly hard labor. But it’s what I do, it’s my job, and it’s become who I am, despite my desire to not have that happen.
Really: There used to be two Jeff Edelstein’s: The columnist/ radio guy, and the human being. That was 15 years ago. But as technology became more and more important to my daily life, the lines blurred between the two me’s. Now? I’m always on, always tuned in, always on the lookout for the next thing to write about.
When I’m on vacation, it’s like Neo getting unplugged from the Matrix. It’s shocking. It almost physically hurts. I can’t tell you how many times I’m going to absentmindedly reach for my phone that I always keep in my pocket. But it’s not going to be in my pocket. It’s going to be in a safe.
Simply put? Modern life has overtaken life.
Again, this is a weak complaint. I have it good. I’m living in prosperous times. But good golly, the flow of information I need to be connected to in order to perform my jobs is non-stop. Really: If you picked up a science fiction novel in 1980 that showed someone constantly having information downloaded into their brain, it would be rightly described as dystopian science fiction.
Well, here I am, Mr. Dystopia. And I bet you’re not too different. Even if your job doesn’t depend on it, I bet you’re also plugged in to the point you sometimes want to scratch out your eyeballs.
It didn’t have to be this way. Life could’ve remained simpler. But we took a bite of the apple, and that’s that. We are information junkies. We always need more.
I’ll leave you with this … a parable I once heard that’s really stuck with me, despite me completely not following through on the message ...
Guy sitting under a tree, smoking a cigarette, middle of the day, cooking a fish over a makeshift grill. Second guy walks by - he’s a three-piece suit wearin’ sunuvagun - and says, “Hey there, why aren’t you out there working?” First guy says, “Caught a fish, that’s all I have to do.” The suit-wearin’ fella says, “Yes, but if you caught two fish, you could sell one.”
To which the first guys says, “And then what?”
And then the suit-wearin’ guy says, “Then you could use the money to buy a better fishing rod, and catch four fish, and sell three, and then take that money and buy a bigger boat, and hire another guy, and catch even more fish, and then sell more fish, and then you buy a second boat, and hire a crew, and before you know it, you’ll be king of the seas! You’ll be rich beyond your wildest dreams! You’ll have a fleet of boats, thousands of fisherman, millions of dollars!”
“And then what?” first guy.
“You’ll be rich,” the second guy says. “Beholden to no one. You’ll be free. You’ll be able to do whatever you want.”
The first guy stubs out his cigarette, takes a bite out of his dinner, and says, “What the (bleep) does it look like I’m doing right now?” says the