Even though it was warm outside tonight, it was very foggy and a little “rainy” (what I mean is it was not really raining, but there was a mist that hung in the air). I had a difficult time seeing because the fog/mist was so thick. I had a hard time concentrating because of the sounds from the fairgrounds. The demolition derby must have been tonight, because I kept hearing loud engines and announcements in the distance. I thought about Thoreau and the section in Walden where he wrote that his thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the train in the distance and that this caused him to realize how much time had passed. The sound of the demolition derby made me think about how humans have advanced so much that we do such silly things to entertain ourselves. Even during Thoreau's time I am sure that there were plenty of people (farmers and even housewives) who did not have time to become bored. I sometimes think that animals have it easy because the are too busy surviving (and intelligence is a factor, too) to become bored, angry, depressed, or lonely. I then thought about how some domestic animals, like dogs, can actually suffer from depression and boredom. Is this because they have become too domesticated?
Thoreau had written that, “He [man] has no time to be any thing bu a machine” (4). I feel like I both agree and disagree with this statement after going over some of the ideas I had thought about on my walk. People have too much time, now. I of all people know what it is like to have multiple things going on at once. I work 40+ hours a week as an assistant manager, I go to UMF full-time, I have a husband, dog, and apartment to take care of, and I try to cram in things like exercise into my week. When I really think about it, though, the only reason I “need” to do these things is because of how much luxury humans now have. I don't have to pump water from a well by hand and boil it to wash (well, unless my landlord is having trouble with the water heater). My husband doesn't have to go hunting (funny how that is now a leisure activity, by the way) and I don't NEED to spend hours cooking if I don't want to; I can buy food that is already cooked from a variety of restaurants and markets. I feel so spoiled when I think about how easy life actually is. I go to college so that I can leave my soul sucking job for one that I can get enjoyment out of. I don't NEED to be a full-time student in order to simply survive. At the same time, the economy and society make me feel like I do need to do what I'm doing to live a happy life. So, I do feel like a machine very often because at this point in my life I have little time for fun.
On my walk I thought about how Thoreau made it his routine/ritual to bath in the pond every morning. To me, this seemed like a way of “awakening” himself for every new day. I am contemplating coming up with some sort of daily/morning routine of my own. Having a morning routine might be a good way to remind me that it is a new day and not to take “life” too seriously. I find myself very stressed out by the busy life I am currently living, so some of Thoreau's words have really been burned into my mind.
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ReplyDeleteAs terrible as it is to have to admit that, in a time of economic crisis brought on chiefly by a waning supply of oil, our society can attempt to silence the sound of our impending doom with a sporting event which wastes as many valuable resources as a demolition derby, it seems even more disappointing that you should have been bothered with constant reminders of its sick irony every few minutes as you describe. I think that it would be just the perfect coincidence if you had been reading The Ponds during the closing festivities of the fair week, the sounds of crunching metal and canned loudspeaker excitement sounding off while reading of Thoreau's beloved train, "That devilish Iron Horse, whose ear-rending neigh is heard throughout the town" (181). I believe that you are right, we really can do some silly things with our free time nowadays, and chances are you are not alone in thinking that domesticity can breed an unhealthy lack of substance in our lives.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, day after day, I find myself thinking about why it is I need to get up and go to my own soul-sucking job, why I need to pay to have my car fixed, and why, when I do have some time off from work or school or doling out money for so many things, I usually sit around in front of the TV or browse the internet. Maybe it's the overwhelming range of choices of what I can do with my free time that makes me choose the path of least resistance. The great conflict seems to be that one set of comfort-driven activity is stifling the other: If I spend all of my time earning money so that I can pay for school so that I can have a job that will help me buy more comforts, how much time do I have left to devote to being comfortable with what I have now? How strange it is that though we don't have to pump water or churn butter with our day, we set ourselves up for more work in the long-term, and feel out of place when we are at ease.
You do a good job of shedding light on our current society's strange predicament, and though I don't have any answers, it's always good to keep such things in mind. Then again, we may just get to live out two lives in our time: who knows if we will be pumping water and churning butter in a decade or so, those demolition derbys finally having drained our livelihood dry?