I want modernity leave. I want to wake up with the sun rise, not with an alarm clock. I want to go to sleep with the moon rise, not with electric lights lengthening my days for hours on end.
I want modernity leave to experience the sound of tree roots moving downward through the earth, sucking up the rains deposited directly into the water table rather than running off our asphalt roads and concrete patios straight into the ocean.
I want modernity leave to walk to places of beauty I may be able to reach on foot or on scooter. (Bicycles seem too tall for me at this time of life when the ground is farther away from my head than it was when I was a kid, and I don't want an ambulance to wail its way toward my limp body should I fall off the damn bike!)
I want a modernity break so I may putter around and make things of beauty and utility. A friend recently took a workshop at The Crucible - a place for hot art: Kiln work and copper enamel. She fired tiles and used them to make mosaic stepping stones. Her garden is criss-crossed with these beautiful mosaic-lined pathways lacing together rows upon rows of pots holding vegetables from Artichokes and Zucchini, and flowers as perennial as asters, buttercups, and zinnias. I love that you can wander on any of the paths and come back to where you began having seen bees at work, wind whipping vines, and sunlight dancing on leaves of every size and shape. Fragrant flowers festoon the fences, activating the senses.
Modernity leave sounds juicy... like something creative and ultimately productive.
Modernity leave sounds doable, where maternity leave would be ridiculous at seventy.
Modernity leave sounds implausible but not impossible. But modernity leave also sounds idealistic and not intrinsic to how enmeshed my life has become with techno gadgets.
Speaking with a client today, I told her I don't use an electronic calendar, because I don't like it beeping at me when I forget to look at it. I use a pencil and a paper calendar with pretty photos of animals and landscapes from snow-covered mountains to deep green algae ponds. The client and I set an appointment. When I remember where I set it down, I can always find what I'm doing for the day/week/month -- simply by looking at it. Silently.
I appreciate that some folks have immaculate desks where they can see the wood gleaming or formica shining - free of clutter. I appreciate that electronic devices save trees from being chewed up to make paper. I appreciate that 'smarter-than-I- am-phones' can do the work of several people in keeping track of my mileage, maps, money, and managing my time, calendar, phone messages and more. I'm just not equipped to handle the noise of the digital world. I don't like things beeping, buzzing, boring into my head space with reminders and updates. I have lots of little slips of paper always giving me the slip... where DID I write that address? But then, I find it amidst the piles on the desk and find something else I was looking for weeks ago, and all's well with the world. Hidden surprises!
I want modernity leave so I may commune with the grasses, birds, trees, and flowers. I want modernity leave so I may sit down to tea with a friend and look her in the eyes and have a real conversation. No phones ringing for an hour will allow that conversation to run along smoothly, coherently, without hiccups caused by someone excusing herself to return an important call or an email because goddess forbid there should be a delay in responding to someone who isn't even in the same state, let alone the same city as oneself, leaving the tea partner feeling like chopped liver!
Modernity leave would allow me to walk instead of drive to the store. Of course, where I live that would be a day's journey there and back. As my husband jokes, we could walk downhill to the store just fine. The return trip uphill would be so much faster because the ambulance would put its siren on to get us home quickly!
*. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *
In 1929 my grand parents had one car and two children. The work they shared was caring for the kids and a chicken ranch in San Bernardino -- until the crash left them ranchless, but still with four mouths wanting food. They moved into Los Angeles and a small bungalow owned by Grammy's sister Mary Polly and her husband Jack. My mother was then ten years of age, and Uncle Larry six. Gramps sought work building airplanes for McDonnell Douglas. Back to his roots in early aircraft. He began with Glenn L. Martin, building airplanes in Seattle, 1910, just thee years after the Wright Brothers' first flight in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.
When she was small and still living on the chicken ranch, my mother tied turkey feathers to her belt and jumped off the barn roof, knowing, thinking, believing she could fly. From that jump forward, until she died and was cremated at nearly ninety-three years of age, she had a metal rod in her right arm that kept her bones straight after the fall when she didn't fly off the roof after all. Gravity sucked. I wonder if they used the Model T to drive little Barbara to the hospital for doctoring up, or if the country doctor made a house call? I'll never know. Still, I dream of flying. Modern times give me different images of flying from turkey feathers tied to my waist and shoulders.
Gimme that olde time volare-ing any time over modernity... that's good enough for me. Maybe I could do with Selecto-Techno? Have my convection-oven baked cake and eat antibiotics with robotic arms when needed too?
No comments:
Post a Comment