The world is always ON
December 4 2010, 5:24 PM
Late at night in my house should be a time of silence and darkness, but it
is not. The fridge makes the odd noise from time to time. The forced air
furnace fills the house with warm air and white noise. My Blackberry buzzes
(if I forget to turn it off) to tell me I have received an email from
software somewhere running to insure that I am informed of something
worthwhile at 1 or 4 am. People on the west coast of North America or
somewhere in Africa or Europe can also send the blackberry in a vibrating
frenzy with (to me) a late night tweet. Even when the house is silent,
there are LEDs green and red and bluish white blinking everywhere, like the
eyes of small creatures. My house is always ON. And as goes my house, goes the world. Everywhere it should be silent and
dark is actually humming and blinking with light. I was reading stories by
Charles Dickens recently in which he takes night walks around London. There
is activity in the wee small hours of the morning then, but what struck me
was how dark and silent his London must have been, mostly. Now the world is
becoming more and more urban, and all urban areas are infested with power
lines and digital equipment everywhere you go. And all of this equipment is
connected to and networked with equipment all around the world. And though
we may take advantage of the darkness to turn ourselves off and get some
rest, the rest of the world is busy doing what the rest of the world does
when they are awake. And what they do comes to us, even while we are
sleeping. For today and tonight, the world is always ON.
-----------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.
is not. The fridge makes the odd noise from time to time. The forced air
furnace fills the house with warm air and white noise. My Blackberry buzzes
(if I forget to turn it off) to tell me I have received an email from
software somewhere running to insure that I am informed of something
worthwhile at 1 or 4 am. People on the west coast of North America or
somewhere in Africa or Europe can also send the blackberry in a vibrating
frenzy with (to me) a late night tweet. Even when the house is silent,
there are LEDs green and red and bluish white blinking everywhere, like the
eyes of small creatures. My house is always ON. And as goes my house, goes the world. Everywhere it should be silent and
dark is actually humming and blinking with light. I was reading stories by
Charles Dickens recently in which he takes night walks around London. There
is activity in the wee small hours of the morning then, but what struck me
was how dark and silent his London must have been, mostly. Now the world is
becoming more and more urban, and all urban areas are infested with power
lines and digital equipment everywhere you go. And all of this equipment is
connected to and networked with equipment all around the world. And though
we may take advantage of the darkness to turn ourselves off and get some
rest, the rest of the world is busy doing what the rest of the world does
when they are awake. And what they do comes to us, even while we are
sleeping. For today and tonight, the world is always ON.
-----------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.