Friends, relationships, and the fear of reprisal,

A friend of mine, +Song Smith has written a very insightful post about protecting your privacy when using the internet. This is an important concern in today's hypersensitive world. She is a thoughtful, entertaining person, who posts polite, interesting articles about life, travels, and a charming cat with an excess of personality.  She has a right to be concerned, too. People are vigilant about anything that might offend them no matter how inoffensive it might be.

But, it reminds me of the power of the internet, an awesome, frightening power. It is so wild, so wonderful, so terrifying, and so intimidating and yet so commonplace we just look at it as part of life.

This morning, a friend of mine from Kuwait sent me an article about Babylon that he is going to post on our history blog. I finished a short story for a contest a friend of mine from New Hampshire is sponsoring, I congratulated a friend of mine from Germany on her recent marriage, and commented on a blog post from a friend in England.

I have never met any of these people, but they are friends, and I have a relationship with all of them. It is through the power of the world wide web.

Back to Song Smith, though. Here is an educated, reasonable, person whose posts express the ebb and flow of life as an adult. There is nothing you couldn't let your Mother read. But, she has to wear the mask of anonymity out of fear of retribution.

There was an old saying; "your right to swing your arm stops just short of my nose." I don't know how true that ever was. Having lived through several decades of hate, envy and bitterness it seems more cliche than rule of thumb. Today noses are being disjointed, and put out of place over the slightest breeze.

Here is a multi-lingual person with a delightful sense of humor, a desire to connect with people and find some kinship being throttled by people whose idea of being moral and proper is holding people to standards that only apply to others.

And, that is the problem with the internet, many people hide behind the distance to attack others, and they should be ignored. And many use the internet to bludgeon others with judgement and hate and they should be ignored, as well. But, too many people are afraid to say, "This is not a problem, this is a solution, only small minded people would mistake the two."

We have unique opportunity to bring the world closer together, find similarities, common areas of interest, a chance to see in others the things we enjoy in ourselves. But, if we only see the things that frighten us about ourselves it becomes a wedge that drives us further apart, and fills us with dread, and hate.




Which direction will society look, nobody knows, history doesn't offer much insight, but at the same time it does not inspire much optimism.

Independence Day, and Safety, for the Fish, Anyway.

Yesterday was the 4th of July, and we celebrated by having our internet access and cable television restored. We had been independent, on and off, (sometimes it would work, and sometimes it wouldn't) for the last week of both. It seems there is always advice on the wisdom of unplugging, and we have conducted an unintentional experiment.  It was not terrible, but it was not liberating either. In the interest of honesty it should be noted we still had iPhones and internet at work.  So it was not complete isolation.  But, it is up and running again, thank you gods of technology.

Also, we were independent of fish. Which is not unusual, we spend most of our life independent of fish. What made it spectacular is the fact that we bought fishing gear, and tackle, and fishing licences, and went in search of the wily, elusive beasts. But, they managed to outsmart us, and gave us the slip.

This comes as no surprise, of course, I used to fish all the time, and fish have outmaneuvered me at every turn. But, it is was about the chase, the sport, the game.  Fishing is something I do, catching fish is not.

But, my son talked me into fishing with him.  Friday we headed over to the outdoor sporting goods mega store.  Several dollars later we walked away with new rods, reels, lures, and hope (which does spring eternal, by the way).

On the way home we scouted a few good locations, tramping through a soggy forest in the rain. You need to sacrifice to achieve success. Since the internet was working, temporarily when we got home, and our state has an online option we got our fishing license emailed to us, and we were ready.

Saturday was bright, warm and perfect for fishing.  Off we went, after a while, no point in being a damned fool about it, anyway. Bottles of water, and cold Dr. Pepper, and the adventure was joined.

Fishing is not a particularly complicated activity, but, there is a technique involved, a technique we need to master. We tangled a lot of fishing line, and had to cut it off our reels. Here is a fishing tip, take a sharp knife and bandages.  It is probably a good idea to take some hand wipes and a few snacks, as well. There is a lot a fisherman has to remember.

So, we fished for several hours, and we carried all of our trash out, and disposed of it properly. We cut away line and we lost a lure, we walked away laughing. And that means it was worth every cent.

Here is a little warning to all of the fish in the area.  You can run and you can hide and you can swim right up to the bank and laugh in my face, but I am coming for you. Just kidding, your are safe. Snacks and soft drinks you might be in trouble.

Please, be careful.

I might have been on TV today, maybe.  I was driving to work this morning, and while taking the ramp onto the freeway that delivers commuters downtown I noticed an odd looking apparatus on top of a car in the other lane and several hundred feet in front of me.

My only option, accelerate, pass, and inspect this car, it had decals that from a distance were illegible, the whole thing was intriguing.  Passing the car at about 60 miles an hour provided enough opportunity to examine the device on the car as well as some of the stickers.  It was some sort of square cube, mounted on a tall stand and it had a sign that said "LIVE" and the car was tattooed with the identification and call letters of the local affiliate of one of the national networks.

It must be a camera, and it has to be part of the traffic report, and it must be some sort of "live look at traffic conditions" and I might have been on camera, even for just a moment or so.  Cool!  Then I remembered that my hair was such a mop of unmanageable, hideous, tangles that I just kind of left it, and it had been a couple of days since the last shave, and my shirt has a slight tear, and oh my what a mess.  No worries, I wasn't doing anything embarrassing.  So, that was good, but, it brought back some memories.

One time, long ago, I was watching a Monday Night Football game.  This game was so long ago that the announcers were "Gifted" Frank Gifford, "Dandy" Don Meredith, and Howard "the Mouth" Cosell.  Yes, I am that old.  The television camera would scan the crowd, as they still do, and settled on interesting, or attractive people.  Eventually, it settled on a woman, elegantly dressed, with shining, beautiful, flowing hair, a woman of such exquisite beauty she seemed the perfect counterpoint to the brutality of the game.  She looked the picture of taste, class, and grace.  And then she put her finger in her nose, right there on national television.  Frank Gifford proved his "gift' extended beyond the field when he said "almost perfect," as the camera hastily moved away from the woman.  

My brief encounter with potential TV stardom and the potentially disastrous consequences of uncombed hair and a scruffy looking beard left me thinking of that woman, and what had happened to her.  Had that one brief indiscretion changed her life?  Was she overlooked for potential promotions, was she denied jobs modeling fashion wear, did her husband leave her?  Did that one mistimed simple act cost her a happy life?  Probably not, there was no YouTube then, no social media to spread this picture all over the world.  Today, if a person were caught on camera doing something like that, it would be everywhere.  She would have become an internet sensation.

In the novel "1984" George Orwell posited that the government would become so powerful, and all encompassing, that it would intrude into every corner of life,  "Big Brother" would watch every move, and swoop in at the slightest provocation, whisking an offender away and threatening to let rats eat their face off.  Orwell was half right, he foresaw the constant observation, and the encroachments on privacy and freedom.  But, he had no way of knowing about government incompetence, the sequester, and furlough days, and the constant, endless, whining sound coming from the nations capitol.  But, the intrusion is still there, and as a citizen you need to exercise great caution, one wrong move and your life could be ruined.  To paraphrase the Great Swamp Philosopher, Pogo "we have met Big Brother, and they are us."  Don't worry, I have your back.