Next to me, just to the left, sits a series of notes and pages. Penned in bursts through out the day, before the hope for peering in upon some formerly thunk-up wisdom even gets a moment to engage my attention, I choose now to ignore them. For whatever impulse helms this moment, be it ingenious or idiotic- reject the earlier words shall I.

After all, winging it is what we do here. Isn’t that right, dear reader?

Yet within the mild fury of diving into the page unbeknownst to any of us as of yet, there is this idea itching about my head. Has been, so I’m sure it is littered about those notes I am ignoring. It isn’t quite even an idea. Not really, not fully. It is something else. Were I some jagged noir investigator, I might even call it a hunch. But something is, and has been amiss. And that is not to say some perfection has so clearly been about our world and times as of late or even ever- but even in the bouts of all our former chaos, this ache about the spirit had been something different.

And while I claim this feeling as vague, the truth would proclaim that I have a bit of a clearer picture of the dismay than that. In fact, I’ve even been having discussions about it. With others, along with my conscious reflections. Could be that you have been having these sorts of discussions yourself. A betting narrator would assume so, since you are here with me now.

There is a disconnection in our connectivity.

For even in this world where a message can get halfway around the globe before you can reach down and scratch your ass, we seem so far away. And that divide has been growing, both in steady paces and insane leaps for the span of much of my life. We are agitated, even living in what remaining abundance might remain of this rock. And that satiation cannot be met by physical means. Not really, or at least not in the long run. And eventually this disconnect turns itself into a greed, savage and self-destructive. That all the more only leaves us with less and less.

Now, part of this is a design. You can find the articles about the technocratic leaders making sure the digital product is geared towards addictive engagement. There are even lawsuits and the like, collectives conglomerated to claim and fight against this sort of predatory production. The digital drug that robs us like some vicious substance, only one that is entirely accepted by the social consciousness.

Or, it was.

For while its tendrils still wrap around so much of the every moment of daily life, especially for the larger masses of working class and poor- I’ve heard from enough of my near peers that the fix is no longer as pleasurable as it once was. That awareness of the damage done and still in the works is prevalent enough to inspire at least the faintest desire for change. Even in those that understand next to nothing of it, that ache, that itch is still stumbling below the surface.

And mind you, as much ignorance as I enjoy instilling into my being, I know the hypocritical nature of all those former paragraphs. I sit alone on a computer in order to put this digital page out to the world, knowing full well how much of my own time and mind has already been wasted in the last twenty-four hours alone on the very sort of business that saps the soul of this writing fool, and us all collectively. I will send this out to the theoretical billions of minds and eyes, yet squander my own mind on rot far too often. Hell, I’m not even likely going to read any of these words back myself before they get yeeted into the technological abyss.

How’s that for arrogance?

But it isn’t here where the void of modern humanity gets itself rectified. At best, a few hundred words can serve to be but a step towards better surrounded in this world of otherwise chaos. If this does anything, I hope it is this- once you are done reading this, you step away from whatever microchip enabled contraption got you here. And connect. Not through wires and electromagnetic waves, but through every other method there is. Go to some place where other people are, even within your own domicile. Or in public, even if only among strangers. Or just to this Earth, the home still so big for us, even if insignificant in the cosmic. Listen to the life all around. The clatter of some commuter train, or even just the amphibians singing to the end of summer. Even if alone, you can find some human eternity echoed upon some printed page, assuming it was first written by some organic mind and hands. At the very least, perhaps a phone call, if there is no one else around. To hear a voice, as opposed to some words more superficial due to the confines of text.

And if you can find no one and no where else in this moment, explore the self through some sentient expression. Some art, or something sonic. Or just plain old undistracted pondering. An experience without aide. And trust me, I know how terrifying that can seem. So says the semi-hermit man in his hermit woodland abode.

For there are a great many things we as a species must get to doing, for the potential doom is not entirely contrived. Plenty of it is real and pertinent to these times. But we will solve none of this existential ache as a series of island. Humanity moves forward as continents, as collectives even if not entirely uniform. In fact, it is our dissonance that makes eventually harmony so sublime.

There will be those that are against this, and while I’ve read enough comic books to see the hero’s quest as the only path away from villainy, I try and remind myself that bad guys are better written in books than the ones we muck about with now. Power and potency are not the same, and the former only holds sway as long as we allow it to. Which is the secret so obviously in front of our eyes. We so often, especially in this modern world, choose our chains.

Which means that to break away is a choice, just the same. Even if it appears as though there isn’t. Giving up is a choice, and being that it is, means that it need not be inevitable. Just because it can’t quite be seen, doesn’t mean there isn’t a better way that all this can go.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get to dinner with some friends. If you want to talk more, we can find the space and time, for sure. But this will do for this week’s rant. Much obliged for your participation in this experiment, where and whenever this words might find you.