Being alive and aware of oneself as a living thing, having to interact with all sorts of other living things, really doesn't ever get less strange. In a lot of ways it actually becomes stranger. I can only speak (or write, in this case) for myself but the desire is to have more simplicity and directness, but as time marches on and the newer generations assume primacy, things make less and less sense to my old brain. As I've stated before I don't see this as bad, I just see it as an evolution. I think there's a time for each of us, whether it's a narrow window or a span of years, where things make sense and we have a place in the world. I also believe that time passes, no matter what we want or choose.
As a musician I've seen things move from analog and human to digital and largely dehumanized. Where we praised artists for their personalities and quirks, which equated to originality, to glory in imperfection, the drive for decades has been to produce increasingly marketable product and things which have less of all those qualities we once sought out. At the same time the empire created by record labels is all but gone. But its impact is still felt in the fact that now an artist's look is the first standard by which he or she is judged. It's ridiculous. Can you imagine someone like Jimi Hendrix, Frank Zappa or the Beatles trying to launch a career now?
It's all moot, though. Time marches on. The standards of the day pass with a new day. What's viable today means nothing tomorrow. One of my stranger exchanges was not too many years ago, asking about who I thought was the greatest _________ of all time. When I started describing those musicians who created something new and allowed for the development of entire new vocabularies and genres, the response was "But they couldn't shred."
Surreal.
Obsolescence happens. It's an inevitability. But it's nothing one can be prepared for. When I left social media it was because I felt an increasing disconnect with technology and with those who rely on it for everything. Means of communication were changing in ways I didn't grasp, both in terms of the interface and in the language used to navigate it. Once a friend of mine wrote to tell me she was tired of my swanning about it I knew it was time to remove myself from things, from any kind of a public light.
What's funny is that I embraced social media in its early days. I loved it. Connecting with people all over the world on any number of levels, exchanging all kinds of things and getting new input as well as distraction. It was glorious. Most of my friends at the time didn't understand and wanted no part of it. By the time most of them joined MySpace and later Facebook, I was networked to tens of thousands of people all over the planet. When those connections became too much to negotiate while having a regular life, my friends were all at the point where I was ten or more years earlier. Consequently when I jumped ship, no one got it.
And no one uses much else for communication anymore. Texting is preferable to calling. Email is a thing of the past. Letters are an idea from another century. The last women who wanted to date me gave me phone numbers and told me never to call; text only.
But I am from another century. I adore letters, both reading and writing them. The phone allows me something a text won't provide. And I can't keep up with technology. The idea of changing all my communications tools every few months is beyond me. Changing the operating system on a computer several times a year makes no sense to me.
Then again, the vast majority of the adult experience makes no sense to me. Everyone wants sex and love but no one wants to talk. New and exciting is somehow better than what's fulfilling and meaningful. Moving on to a new person with whom one has no real connection is preferable to fixing the problems that exist in a relationship and maintaining a friendship.
I have never grasped how someone can be central in a person's life, but after the romantic relationship is done all contact must be severed. That just levels me. But as I've written previously, I never learned how to fall out of love with someone.
These days it almost makes more sense not to connect with people, not to bring them into my world, if they're just going to disappear without warning or explanation. I think I'd rather simmer in the cauldron of my own brain than be left stranded and cold over and over.
Don't get me wrong: I do in fact miss society and people. But I miss basic civility more. Simple considerations. Living in a time where people hang up the phone without saying goodbye or walk away from receiving a gift without acknowledging thanks is not for me. I can't be someone other than who I am and who I am is no longer someone welcomed by society.
A friend asked not long ago if being alone was better than being surrounded by people who want a part of me. The answer was yes. I shared too much of me for too long with those who didn't actually care or even want to know who I am. I'd rather keep contact with the tiny handful of people who are friends now. It is wholly possible that the future will bring wonders I can't imagine at this moment, but for someone rapidly closing in on codgerdom, actual reality is a better choice than virtual reality.
Except here.
Damn it.
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