All we ever want is a little bit of peace. A place with friendly faces and maybe front porches. Now… think about what the opposite of that is.
Anxiety, today, is that dread. World gone mad, and that guy or girl screeching at you that you aren’t involved enough, not voting hard enough, not concerned enough, not angry enough. If you had 57 ribbons for awareness and are pinning on a 58th you would see how the problems of the world are all hinged on how aware you are.
All we ever want is to walk in a peaceful village, or the countryside, downtown or a long dirt road, and if we perchance meet someone we say “how do you do”. And smile. We all want to have a good day, even when it’s tough and things look bleak out on the horizon if we focus too much on them.
Every day the world gets larger, and smaller. Larger – in that the sheer number of things we are supposed to care deeply about, worry about, be aware of, etc. grows every hour of every day. Exponentially. If only you knew more about the sorrow, pain, suffering… if only you piled more of it on your back. If only you cared more!
Smaller – in that all of the problems of the world are sucked in, closer and closer, the walls close in, the world and the universe shrinking to bring all those woes tighter and tighter to us.
We were once hemmed in by mountains and rivers and oceans. Without the technology to bring all the woes to us. The lives of our locality – were buffered by time and distance. If a devastating hurricane struck in Galveston or a typhoon on the other side of the world, the misery was local. Bad, but local. That farmer in China or on the steppes of Russia never knew what happened in Galveston. The problems he faced in his own life were sufficient. He had neighbors to care for and love.
I remember the first time I recognized the phenomenon that distant woes could be brought home in an increasing way in relation to the technology available to us. Increasing as technology advanced. It was after the fact, studying it (I was only five years old when it happened, but I studied it later, in my teens) but it was the first time I realized this thing… Roberto Clemente, the great baseball player for the Pittsburgh Pirates, died in 1972 in a plane crash. He was flying in a plane full of relief aid for the victims of an earthquake in Nicaragua. That was his home country, and he took on the burden and gathered up supplies and booked a plane and was going there to help when his plane crashed.
I remember thinking “Oh my! What a great humanitarian. What a devastating loss.” And the sorrow was doubled because he died trying to help.
Later – much later – I learned that most of the aid was inappropriate to the situation. People had gathered winter clothing and sent TV dinners… to a tropical climate. People felt better about DOING SOMETHING. Any real aid, financial or otherwise, was stolen by the politicians in power. They grew richer. The worrying and misery made them more powerful.
The point is that care and awareness was multiplied. That expansion of guilt and responsibility was part of the explosive growth of the techno-society. No end.
And the prophets of awareness and of the increase in shared misery have louder bullhorns now. You can’t escape it unless for a moment you turn off the screens and look up from your shoes and walk your village and identify your real neighbor.
This is why the politicians have learned that division and hatred and anger and misery are powerful means of control.
If space exploration and travel through the stars happens soon, like they say it will, and if there are woes in worlds unknown, far away, they will be heaped on too. They’ll build pipelines and wireless ways to bring the misery to your doorstep. It’s too powerful a tool wielded by the people who want power.
And it’s all a racket.
When I say “shop local” or when I say that we should localize our love and care it is because to think and act locally is an act of self-preservation. And it is a holy calling. It is the shoe-leather of love to thy neighbor. The destroyer of worlds would have you hate your neighbor because what is happening a million miles away is too dire to be subjugated by provincial self-interests. And besides, my neighbor has bad politics. Screw him.
Now I am become Awareness, The Destroyer of Worlds.
The destroyer of worlds would say that we should walk by our neighbor in need because we have higher purposes, and don’t you know there is a critical need in a distant universe that requires your attention? Turn on the news and despair! It is your duty. The destroyer of worlds is fine with you shipping your dollars to Bentonville or Kiev or Alpha Centauri, because… well, just because. And he’ll give you a thousand-thousand rationalizations for why you should remain angry and enraged and anxious about distant worries, and never once think about helping build and strengthen your own peaceful village, one in which you could walk and find a familiar face to smile at and love.
Just my two cents.
