I grow old… I grow old…
I shall wear the bottom of my trousers rolled
~ T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
Hmmm, when will I be able to rise above it all and be gravity-free?
I expect there will be a time when I look back on the arc of my life and search for the point at which I stopped caring about keeping up with the relentless march of time. In other words, the date at which I hung out my Don’t Bother Knocking Because I Won’t Answer sign.
Some will no doubt argue that there should not be such a day. Life, they will assert, is a never-ending journey that requires that we regularly renew our lease on it which in turns mean committing to keep up with the pack. As long as I am in the workforce, that argument is valid.
However, I will be retiring in a little under a year. If it was feasible for me to retire to a remote cabin in the woods, I might choose that lifestyle. But for various reasons, that will not happen.
However, a day will arrive when I become a dissident in terms of the big three imperatives that seek to define our future.
The Microsoft Imperative
Microsoft regularly rolls out new versions of their software with ever more sophisticated and complicated capabilities. Each new version is designed to transform and further interconnect our lives. The effect is to bind us together in an ever tightening and inescapable virtual web.
The Google Imperative
Google continuously pushes the boundaries of artificial intelligence, cloud computing and consumer electronics. Each advance is designed to anticipate how we think before we think it and provide us with no need to think about it virtual or virtually driven products. I fear for the future of independent thinking.
The Meta Imperative
Meta (aka Facebook) is leading the charge on the transformation of our lives to being social media centric. Each new wave lures us deeper into the metaverse. The end game seems to be to convince us that augmented reality is better than the real thing.
As for me, when I roll up my trouser bottoms and leave them that way, I will disengage from the big three imperatives and sever the tether that binds me to the virtual web. It is my desire to float blissfully in a virtual gravity-free zone.
I will float above all the virtual madness out of reach of the three imperatives. Yes, I will be considered an anachronism and I will wear that title proudly.
~ Now Available Online from Amazon, Chapters Indigo or Barnes & Noble: Hunting Muskie, Rites of Passage – Stories by Michael Robert Dyet
~ Michael Robert Dyet is also the author of Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel which was a double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael’s website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com .
~ Subscribe to Michael’s Metaphors of Life Journal aka That Make Me Go Hmmm at its’ internet home www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog2. Instructions for subscribing are provided in the Subscribe to this Blog: How To instructions page in the right sidebar. If you’re reading this post on another social networking site, come back regularly to my page for postings once a week.
Tags: Facebook · Google · Meta · metaphor · Michael Robert Dyet · Microsoft · T.S. Eliot · The Love Song of J. Alfred PrufrockNo Comments