Searching for answers

I recently watched, again, the movie Minority Report. This brought to light many surprises, already happening, by the way, related to high technology like drones or mini-bots, 3D keyboards and screens, eye identification in retail stores (together with all the marketing this means), new drugs and of course the so-called old human fears.

When I was a kid I wondered if the people from the past (around 2, 000 years ago), had the same fears and feelings than us, the modern or postmodern society, whatever you want to call it. I thought that maybe those feelings were more simple, like flat noncomplex ideas or dreams. But as time passed and I learned more about human history I realized humans are exactly the same complex and anxious organism since the beginning.

Many things might change with time: technology, clothes, entertainment; but in the end, human nature remains the same. So, I have this hypothesis, or maybe it's already a thesis? Humans are not here to technologically evolve (considering 'technology' as the 'de facto' method to ease our curiosity and anxiety for the unknown), but for growing spiritually. Now, this might sound 'New Age', but examine this: we keep searching for answers to old questions, transcendent questions.

I have this feeling that in 2,000 or 5,000 years from now, our species might be settling down around the universe but it will keep asking for the same questions, meditating about this subject. Maybe, a child from a distant and lonely planet, like in the book 'The Petit Prince', by Antoine Saint-Exupery, might find the answer. Something like: 'Here is (the) my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye".  And suddenly, all humanity realized they were looking in the wrong place.

Hard thing to do, or not?

Recently, I received some new tasks from, let's call her K, and K told me incredibly fast and with a high tone of voice, she needed it quickly. So at the end, and this is important, she mentioned: "And for that I will pay you", but this last phrase was launch with a lower tone, like: "I will pay you but to a lower price per hour because we know each other from a long time (you know what we are talking about)".

So, I said to myself: This must stop. I must see her as a real client and not as a long time not seen relative. I say this because I was raised close to many women and I have this high respect for them...but at the same time I know there might be many people who will take advantage of you just because you have shown kindness in the past. So, I must be firm and not be afraid to say: "Wait a minute, I am not going to do that, not under those terms".

Anyway, the thing is that I finally managed to do it today, and her reaction was kind of unpredictable for me. She said in a normal voice tone: Ok, fine. Let's do it your way.

I must confess that I was amazed by that response because I was expecting something like: "Ed, please I ran out of funds..." which it would be a total lie in her case. But no, it was easier than I thought. This lead me to improve my skills when talking to people about business, especially when I fell some tenderness towards them. It's always better to speak with the truth to your partners, only under those terms you can achieve a great deal for both parts, besides being a character-building activity.

Check yourself

When I arrived at the doctor's office, last Friday, and saw him for the first time his looks surprised me. He was a black very tall man with a white afro, small faced,  short neck and long legs and arms which gave him the appearance of a friendly mantis. He was wearing black thick glasses and had a passive but at the same time wise gaze.

At that time I was a little nervous about his questions. I really wanted to find a proper and effective answer to my backache after months without finding a solution and I didn't want to waste any more time in medical examinations.

Fortunately, after checking my file and radiographies the doctor seems to have a response to my suffering. -"You are too fat," he told me. -"You need to lose weight ASAP" eight kilos (17,6 lb.). That was it. It seems you have an elastic body and bodies with that characteristic always suffer when overweight. So he ordered me 10 chiropractic sessions besides swimming and of course a strict diet.

Now I know I have to eat healthy, breath deeply and practice swimming sports in order to relieve this annoying pain. So, I started today with a small vegan pizza and orange juice for lunch, while at night I bought a couple of water bottles. Unfortunately, my girlfriend came by and make me, literally, made me buy a chicken sandwich and a pack of cookies making this new resolution harder than I thought.

No more water for you

Two days ago was the fifth day we had no water (this happened by surprise).  I remembered that day was very hot. The temperature (feeling sensation) was about 35 degrees Celsius (95 F), in Lima 31 degrees is unbearable because the weather usually has an average of 90% humidity. 

I went out from home in my bicycle around 12:00 to breath some less rarefied air. I ride through the narrow and old looking streets of Barranco and suddenly, from time to time, I saw lines and lines of people with colorful buckets waiting to receive some water from reservoirs (located at parks), firemen trucks and cisterns. Children were playing in these lines, some of them using skateboards that later were used to ease the movement of the picturesque buckets. Some policemen were trying to organize the people who were in line but after four days without water, many were quickly losing their patience fearing the water wouldn't be enough to fill all the containers. 

It was something far away from routine, rarely seen where I live. Exciting but also dramatic. I realize how easily our way of life can be altered, how thin our moral and citizenship is broken when a crisis hits us, and how nobody is under control of anything, not even oneself.

Control(ler) Yourself

I like video games, like many other men of my generation. Sometimes I get trapped in this weird sensation of being part of it. Of course, not completely, some rational part of me remains outside the box.

Baby boomers don't quite get the feeling of playing video games. They don't like the immersion my contemporaries experience, which I found strange and even weird. Who doesn't want to be a monster or a hero for a couple of hours? Maybe mining into a planet outside our galaxy or perhaps hunting ancient creatures to help your loved one to come to life again. Think about it...You might play so many other lives through exciting characters. lost yourself into strange worlds, in different time periods under glossy colors and polygonal skin?

It is tempting to stay away from reality for long hours trying to improve our fictional abilities but one must remember this is only a temporarily pleasure and nothing will come out of it but a moment of rejoice. And life is about deeper and more satisfactory experiences. Wait! No. Actually, life is what you want it to be, so keep playing if you want, but control yourself. You know what I am talking about, right?

The Sex Magazine

I used to collect magazines. It was a nice hobby, a little pretentious some might say, but it gave me joy and also a sense of being connected with the world. In my early teenage years it was a good way to spend the little money I earned writing articles. On the other hand, it did take a lot of space from my small room.

A week ago, when I was searching inside some old boxes looking for a marketing book, one of these magazines called my attention.The piece was written from a literary "gonzo" point of view. The magazine name was "Etiqueta Negra" and it included stories about sex in modern times.

I reviewed the pages and after a couple of minutes something amazed me. I realized that over the last years, five or seven I would say, readers have started getting bored very fast; so fast that books and magazines shortened they articles and chapters, and reduced the punctuation to its minimum.

 

Years ago, many authors emphasized pauses. There were more punctuation signs to help the reader to make a pause; a mandatory instant of reflection.

Nowadays, there is noise everywhere, but little to no silence, no pauses, no white pages. no pictures framed. The images and colorful backgrounds now tend to invade the whole page canvas. Today, you just need a nice picture and few columns to create an article. 

 

After thinking about this particular I noticed that a hundred years ago the same occurred. Nowadays is almost impossible to find anybody who reads long articles (10 to 17 pages), much less thick books such as the complete version of 'Dante's Inferno', 'The Quixote', 'King Lear', 'Faust' or even 'Les Miserables.'

 

Will those times come back? Will we discover ourselves longing for a 600 page title that includes dramatic pauses every two or three pages?

 

Perhaps some articles would eventually evolved into some form of images, like those abstract paintings some people love to see but don't dare to judge. Maybe we will come to a time where a book will merely display some odd black and white picture of somebody's armpit and the word 'liquor' highlighted in yellow. Who knows? An image that almost everybody unison might consider the next literary masterpiece while some of us will be looking for old magazines in cardboard boxes.