am i the only one who does not comprehend the abundance of digital devices and how we have become tethered to them as if they were our lifeline?  perhaps they are our lifeline.  when i walk the streets of my beloved city i think i might be the only one who is not lost in the flashing screens of a phone.  phone?!  no, a computer that links us, well, everything and everyone.

still, one must adapt.  i am thinking of getting an iPad that i can take it to bed so i can watch movies, surf the 'net, and do a little reading and writing on it.  but even still, i think it is vitally important to allow some space and time for daydreaming and staring into space.   the mind, the creative mind, requires empty time.  i love my walks because i can daydream.  or not.  i try to do a walking meditation.  often a song, or songs, loop in my brainpan.  i try to let thoughts come and go and not follow them.  sometimes lines of poems arrive, fresh.

but even so, anna and i went to the mall this evening to finish up our holiday shopping.  we have not been to the mall in a year or two.  i go to the barns & noble bookstore on the other end of the parking lot a lot.  it is on the only commercial bookseller left in the area.  the mall on the other hand is huge and located in another, larger, building.

holy shit.  inside the mall, navigating thru the crowds, seeing the video monitors, security on segways, and l.e.d. lights clad on the side of an elevator that when lit up displayed dancing silhouettes and abstract designs, and people using their phones and other devices, i felt like i was on the set of the film blade runner.  any moment i thought i would see deckard chasing down a replicant.

my has this wold changed.  in such a short time.  i'm not lamenting nothing.  just musing and giving my impressions.  i think the changes are fantastic.  i don't know where we are headed.  one guess, surely, is that we are headed toward hell in a handbasket.  then, we are, historically, headed toward hell in a handbasket.  like i said, one must adapt.  the rate of change from an analog to a digital culture is headspinningly fast.  mine is the last generation to be born in an analog world.  what are we missing today?  i'm sure a lot.  what have we gained?  a lot.

even so, i think it utterly necessary to turn off the devices and stare off into space.  daydream a little.  go for walks without a destination in mind.  i don't mean to sound didactic.  take this advice as the musing of a man who grew up without all this sci-fi culture.  we dreamed about it.  now that culture is here.  and the rate of change is mindbending.  anna wondered aloud what kind of job nick will have as a teenager.  i don't know.  for robots and automation will take over many of those traditional menial jobs that i did when i was a kid.  this is a different land now.  how shall we inhabit it?