Deus Ex Machina

I spent last week plunged into consuming impressions at every turn; my imagination has never produced more vivid images. I’ve never been more aware of my environment, or of the possibility in every day. But I’ve also found myself frustrated and prone to weeping, fearful and apprehensive. When they claim that nothing in life comes easy, They aren’t kidding.

Who is “They?” “They” are society, civilization, America, the world. They are everybody I’ve ever had a conversation with. They create the black and white rules it seems I am expected to live by, then bend and break those rules every day until I rebel and slip into a gray area that suits me and few others. And at this stage of my life, I find myself face to face with them at a 9”x6” rectangle that emits an ethereal blue light.

I could survive without the Internet; I did happily for nineteen years. But there is no question that it is the entity that defines my existence this decade. Over half the people I interact with on a daily basis I have never even met before or haven’t seen in years. Many of these near strangers have no idea how great an impact they have on my life. Far more often than I call, I email or instant message family and friends, and a few make time to read the blog. (And yet, you rarely comment. Don’t be shy, people. This is the best way to get my undivided attention.)

I get over 95% of my information from the Internet. Most days my sole contact with other people is the eight hours I spend with my three male coworkers, whose lives revolve around (in addition to the plant) a wife and three sons, a rural homestead, and a bar, respectively. We never discuss politics. We rarely discuss the news. We never delve into the arts. I usually talk to one or two people on the phone after work, but these conversations rarely venture past the mundane, however essential. (These trivial things are, after all, the facets of life we can’t possibly ignore.)

In short, I can’t imagine my life without the Internet. In a large way, it’s creating me. It’s presenting opportunities for education, fellowship and enrichment I would never have otherwise. Maybe it's offering more; I don’t know. I can only hope it doesn’t eventually do me harm. But I am certainly interested to see who I am in twenty, thirty, forty years, and to what degree the World-Wide Web influences my life.

Here’s to the proverbial god in the machine.