unplugging

well. so. i was reading this book Fooling Houdini. it's a fascinating read, although i recommend it with hesitation. or reservation. or maybe both. in one bit, however, when the author is discussing the techniques of distraction, he describes how a part of our brain can be disengaged, essentially, so that we literally do not process the data that our senses are taking in. we literally miss moments of reality. and then it hit me: this is what happens to me, in my life, when i'm on this damn screen. the rest of the world is a dull roar. and i won't lie: i not infrequently go on with the intent of escaping. i don't want to deal with life, with fighting boys or a dirty kitchen or dead chickens or whatever it is. but the fact that in doing so i literally, actually, psychologically, physically am missing reality overwhelmed me. what a horrific thing.
nowadays, we are trained to think that the world of the screen--movie, television, ipad, iphone, DS, video game, whatever--is a functional part of reality. IT AIN'T. to co-opt joe salatin, "folks, this ain't normal." it is in no way normal for us to walk around checking a screen every few minutes. or even every few hours. it is in no way normal to escape from reality into this odd, hazed, digitized, in-every-way fragmented collection of waves and code and wires and what-not.
back in the day . . . you know, wordsworth and coleridge, emerson and thoreau, hell, man, even dylan and simon&garfunkel, the "escape" from reality was nature.


you went outside, alone, away, to reconnect with the earth, with reality, before returning to your own little world that so easily gets blown out of perspective.


but now it's like we're on perpetual overload.


and our minds are perpetually overwhelmed. and we're escaping it by entering a world less real, instead of more. which makes dealing with real, actual reality even harder. so we escape more. and so forth.
little escapes from reality are fine. that's why we have theater, and comedy, and books, and wine, and friends. it's all good. but when we are living in a perpetual escape from reality, and, worse still, replacing it with this seductive non-reality that sorta feels like reality . . .
well folks, this ain't normal.
obviously i'm not "off" screens completely. but i no longer want them at the center of my life. my cell phone (which barely has internet connection and definitely NOT a user-friendly touchscreen interface) is turned off now, most of the time. and the ipad is upstairs in the office. so if i want to "escape" then i have to actually physically remove myself, so i know what i'm doing. i can't pretend to be mama and present when really my whole periphery is turned off and i'm focused on these 11 or whatever inches of screen.
speaking of which . . . time to go, folks. i'm outa here. you know, to the real world.