A Cool Breeze From The Mountain

               I am turning off the television with resolve on this bright spring morning. The disconnect between celebrities chatting about other celebrities one moment and updates on the latest shooting in Atlanta the next is too great. The Internet is a silent scream of war and rumors of war, of disaster and impending doom – but wouldn’t you like to ride out the apocalypse in a brand new SUV? Meanwhile, outside my window a puppy is chasing a butterfly against a backdrop of bright green leaves which magically appeared overnight. Flower buds are opening. The bee hives out by the barn are buzzing with busy workers bringing in loads of pollen to feed their young.

               It is a gorgeous spring day, and even though the beauty conceals a world of life and death drama (the puppy caught the butterfly) just beneath the surface which is in every way as intense as our human struggles, the vibrancy and the honesty of the natural world renders the food for thought proffered by our networks of virtual reality into an indigestible mass.

               To be “connected” in our culture means to be immersed in continuous drama and hype. Is it any wonder that stress related diseases are on the rise in our country, appearing now even among school children? What a gold mine we have become for pharmaceutical companies which offer cures for all the ills of humanity as well as for the side effects of the cures. Where else can we joyfully buy a pill for depression which may cause cancer, constipation and erectile dysfunction - because we have pills for all those conditions too?

               I am concerned for our young and malleable minds, not because of declining test scores based on arbitrary standards designed to measure competitiveness, but because I do not know what tools they are being given for discernment and critical thinking. My own generation did not do much better as we memorized facts and figures. We were taught what to think in order to pass the tests, but rare was the teacher who taught us how to think. We watched too much television, but we were not saturated in information and we were not constantly, during every waking moment, stimulated by input designed to excite and emote for profit and political gain. Consider the decisions made by my generation, the wars we fought, the idiots we elected, the degradation of our Republic that we allowed – and we did it all with the help of television, radio and print alone.  What will the next generation choose after being raised in the chaos of the Information Age?

               The cool breeze from the mountain is imbued with life force this morning. The smell of freshly plowed soil draws me away from this box of sand and wires and away from the vanity and vexation of spirit that we call civilization.