Chaos is calling. And she will be answered. We have been too long civilized, too long dependent on things. We have forgotten the tales we were told at Mother’s knee, tales about love and valor and miracles. Our dreams are of control, shaped out of plastic and spit out of a machine – one size…
Category: Sociology
Bridges In the Mist
It was 3am. I was exhausted. Of the past 24 hours, I’d slept perhaps three. I hadn’t eaten anything that day, and barely allowed any water. I’d spent 12 hours in active labor and then had surgery. They’d just brought me my son back – having insisted on taking him away so I could rest….
Two Dimensional Strangers
Modernity, and life in an urban (or even suburban) context offers a world full of strangers – two dimensional beings, known and categorized in seconds. It is said that you have only seven seconds to make a first impression. So too do all the humans you see around you – seven seconds. How could they…
Soma
In Brave New World, soma is the government supplied drug that numbs and offers blissful escape from any unpleasantness, whether great or small. Modernity has built up her offerings until it is nearly impossible to avoid dusting oneself with our own versions of soma. One starts with the obvious – the internet. But it is…
Spaces
Spaces in our lives create aeration, room in the soil around us for growth, for us to send roots in all directions, not just one. The roots stabilize us, but without the space, we only grow a taproot. The tiny sideways roots hold us together, stabilize us as a whole, and make the soil itself…
Arrow People
Modernity has an ideal. Young, healthy, independent. Oh, it’s not a secret… the secret is the extent to which this ideal has overtaken. Let’s discuss the modern ideal, or as I call them, the arrow people. Physical youth is not necessary for an arrow person, but the trappings of youth are. Excellent health, adventurousness, and…
Defining the Terms
To speak clearly, one must think clearly. To think clearly, one must know what one is speaking of. Defining the terms is important – especially as I’m going to turn some common use on its head. Community: A) A locale (e.g. town, neighborhood) B) A group of people in your local area with whom you…
Living Systems Require Stewards, not Masters
Living things require stewards, not masters. Why? Because living things cannot be mastered wholly – and attempts that are semi-successful ruin their objects. It is time that we gave up the idea that we can be in complete control of that which lives. Land, animals, societies and ourselves – we are far too complex to…
The Need to be Known
The need to be known goes both ways. We need to know those around us, and we need them to know us. This need is social and emotional, it’s also extremely practical. Let me start with an example of the latter. The other day, as I was driving to the grocery store, I saw a…
There Can Be Only One
We live in a culture where we focus our attention on a very few people, and only those people really “matter”. We gossip about their private lives, we envy their possessions, we sigh at their accomplishments, we strategize over their methodology, desperate to reproduce their success… and yet, they are strangers. They might as well…