This caught my attention this morning. It’s because as the page describes the thirty year old contraption, it notes all the ‘old’ ways things used to work. The tape used to pop out of the ‘door’. I love that things were more tangible. You had to open, turn, click, carry, rewind and fastforward. Music, and, my new favourite, Spotify, has become so quick, meaningless, transcient (insert word here_____________) a part of our lives. You’re walking to your own beat, your flicking between songs and downloading some random track without the rest of the album artwork. We never remember the song title or what number it got to in the ‘charts’, the door no longer opens and shuts as we rewind and fastforward… it’s just all too easy and in our culture, you can live with this ease as if it should all go this way-a second nature… feel quite removed from your actions.
I guess everyone’s talking about Michael Jackson lately. I won’t assume to know anything about him apart from what was leaked to me through the news and music charts over the years, but I went back onto youtube and did a treck through memory lane- Man in the Mirror- classic! But,the Earth Song, for instance, it wasn’t a song worth much critical acclaim but it asks loads of questions.. ‘what about (insert word here_________)..?’ I had this sudden feeling of distance. When I was 9 or so, I thought about the rainforests that I heard were being cut down and I thought to myself, what if there’s none of it left when I’m grown up? But in MJ’s music video there is a reinactment of so many ‘world issues’ that you worry about when you’re 9. When you’re a little more grown though, you forget to worry about what’s outside of your life and it all becomes a cloud of otherness. I see it in the way that I flick through the BBC news, join a pointless facebook group to support something, or even just get challenged about life by a song. I have lost my involvement, my naive worry, my opening the tapedeck and rewinding and pausing to look. None of it seems tangible anymore because it’s news and information everywhere.. the tape life is long gone and we’re all scrolling through, downloading and speed reading. Afterall, I’m just one tiny person.
So, I discovered probably my favourite song this last week. I was ill and lay on the couch, apple on knee, hand on mouse just pouring over blog after blog, flickr after flickr, message after email after whatever as I rested… I stopped to ‘attend’ to this most beautiful melody by Iron and Wine. I read the words, played on repeat a few times, watched the scene of the movie its in a couple of times.. all just to get a better grasp of it, to hold it for a moment. When I was 9, I would have cut out the poster of the band or looked through the cassette cover. I would have written the words in my notebook or something, it was a more tangible experience. Now I find myself having to work at making things real and close and an experience, otherwise the world can end up being far off. Life when you’re sick is on the couch, your head in cyber space… maybe life in general is becoming too much like this.
So all this thinking from one picture: the casette tape door that no longer opens.
I have discovered lately how much thoughts have an impact on your life and your day etc. They’re all in your head, right? In some ways they’re as transient as every other communication download you experience each day, but your thoughts are your own. Noone ever knows what you’re really thinking, you can be off in some other world and yet look as present or available as ever. You can think beautiful thoughts or ugly, selfish things… I find myself experiencing real emotion and even regret over mere thoughts, over transient moments where I was focused on something I’d rather not be focused on, and yet it’s easy to feel once removed from it because that’s the way culture goes now.. dipping in and out for a second, no rewinding, no clicking a switch, all just ease and convenience.
My mum said in response to my statement, ‘it just seems like a lot of effort’, ”Well, that’s what life is”. That’s what life is!! Man, we’re deluded into thinking it’s luxury, ease, transient… and yet all along it’s effort. It takes more effort these days to ‘attend’ to something. To look closely and take time and work at taking notice, to listen to a song and the words and think on the meaning and artwork and the point of it. It takes effort to think good thoughts and become the person you’re meant to be rather than to allow life to just happen to you as you scroll through it vacantly. It is, I feel, a big and beautiful effort to live well, much like the grandiose, original walkman is, when compared to your in-ear micro-chip, ease of listening, lightweight, shiny everything else. The lovable life we all think of as ease and availability is not effortless, though it is full of grace.
Yesterdayat Re:Hope Brian asked ‘is the war for godliness worth it?’, as in, the tangible effort it takes to be genuinely good and virtuous and in close relationship with God actually worth tuning in for. The Bible, Malachi, Peter and Brian all say ‘yes’. I’m going to add my ‘yes’ too. It’s the only way to love your life, to live as the kind of person you’re meant to be, to have those good deeds, good words, even good thoughts… yes ma’am! You can listen to the talk here -once it’s up it will be the most recent 1 Peter one.
So in art, life, my moving house this week, my thinking higher thoughts and loving Jesus… even just listening to this most beautiful song ever (most worth listening to recorded version)… I’m going to ‘attend’, take notice, use both hands, two ears, my whole heart.. a lot of effort because it’s worth it…
