old lady and tv
Gave an old lady a ride out today on the way out of school... or at least I had wanted to... she didn't walk too right, holding a pink umbrella the same shade as her shirt, she was walking with a limp. My physiotherapist would have said that her left foot was too pronated, some volunteer type would have commented on society and a minister might have stopped for a photo op. But perhaps thankfully or otherwise for her, today it was just going to be her, an old lady in a pink shirt holding a pink umbrella walking down the slope alone.
And maybe in that split second, there also was me.
Is there a point to any of this? you wonder. I would like to play the sage and speak of the grand plan in the sand and the stars but that is for another time. Random thoughts flitter in and out of our minds the same way we cross each others' paths. Stimuli and reaction. Life is formed of a series of transactions. What did I think of today?
Did I think about my own grandmother deceased? How in her last days, she wasted away while her grandchildren and family extranged looked on. What is one to do in the face of something unfamiliar? Assume the form of something seen on television perhaps? The teary eyes, the awkward silences, don't satisfy me, I've seen it all on channel 8 before, can we change the channel please?
So in many ways I blame TV, it doesn't take much to plunge into existential ennui when the scenes of all of your tragedies and joys look like the replays, the networks well.. replay in the afternoons, just without the killer angles, the attractive people, surround sound and theme music. TIVO takes it one step further. Now you can have your stimuli whenever you want it the way you want it.
And it is no longer safe to be a niche group as well. You can say that "Hey, I'm a fat guy with an embarassing hairdo, surely there is no precedent on TV" but tough luck chum... I'm sure with a large enough satelite dish, I can watch midgets wrestling in siberia, sponsored by Nike no less.
Ok maybe the fat guy with the bad hairdo was an unfair example. I should have mentioned, some people more unique and original, such as the throngs of similarly clad people hanging out at the youth park or the heeren shops expressing their individuality.
Acrimony aside, I paused too long or rather drove too fast, and the "time" between the old lady and me, passed.
I think that if you want to help someone, don't wait too long.
And maybe in that split second, there also was me.
Is there a point to any of this? you wonder. I would like to play the sage and speak of the grand plan in the sand and the stars but that is for another time. Random thoughts flitter in and out of our minds the same way we cross each others' paths. Stimuli and reaction. Life is formed of a series of transactions. What did I think of today?
Did I think about my own grandmother deceased? How in her last days, she wasted away while her grandchildren and family extranged looked on. What is one to do in the face of something unfamiliar? Assume the form of something seen on television perhaps? The teary eyes, the awkward silences, don't satisfy me, I've seen it all on channel 8 before, can we change the channel please?
So in many ways I blame TV, it doesn't take much to plunge into existential ennui when the scenes of all of your tragedies and joys look like the replays, the networks well.. replay in the afternoons, just without the killer angles, the attractive people, surround sound and theme music. TIVO takes it one step further. Now you can have your stimuli whenever you want it the way you want it.
And it is no longer safe to be a niche group as well. You can say that "Hey, I'm a fat guy with an embarassing hairdo, surely there is no precedent on TV" but tough luck chum... I'm sure with a large enough satelite dish, I can watch midgets wrestling in siberia, sponsored by Nike no less.
Ok maybe the fat guy with the bad hairdo was an unfair example. I should have mentioned, some people more unique and original, such as the throngs of similarly clad people hanging out at the youth park or the heeren shops expressing their individuality.
Acrimony aside, I paused too long or rather drove too fast, and the "time" between the old lady and me, passed.
I think that if you want to help someone, don't wait too long.
posted by Shininggoat at 5:36 PM
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