Looking out my Backdoor: Every day the clock resets

Changes happen whether we want them or not, don’t they? It’s just the way it is.

This week we in Mexico fell back, time, the clock. Since I’m not tied to a schedule, my body works by the sun. Sunshine, wake up. Sundown, yawn. You’d think the clock change wouldn’t bother me a bit, but it always does, puts me on edge for a few days. I find myself thinking, whether spring or fall, the clock says “seven,” but, the “real” time is “eight.”

I was blathering on to my son Ben about infrastructure and jobs and commerce, blathering without benefit of much that was factual, more from historical perspective. Or mis-perspective.

Ben quickly set me on a new path of thinking, with information about robots, artificial intelligence and computerization, things I’d rather not think about or know about, frankly. Curmudgeon that I am.

What that talk did was jog me out of my complacency, reminded me that things will change, no matter what I think and they will not return to what might have seemed like former glories, which on closer inspection, shine not so gloriously but look rather corroded.

I like to think I handle change with aplomb, but my first reaction to some of the coming changes Ben laid out before me was not based on thought but an emotion. Fear. Oh, dear. I like to tell you I handle change with excitement, with anticipation, with questions. That’s what I like. But I felt afraid.

Ben painted me a picture of life where technology freed us ordinary people from the slavery of mundane tasks, a world where everybody had food and a washing machine and water, a world where we were free to pursue our passions, our interests in things for which we never seem to be able to make time.

Sounds good, doesn’t it? Sounds like a fairy tale to me. I recalled a video Ben showed me, at least 10 years ago, of communication possibilities between a person and a computer. My eyes stretched wide with wonder. Today that imagination is everyday ho hum reality.

So I suppose that whatever our kids can imagine, perhaps it will become reality for our grandchildren. I like fairy tales. Grew up on them. I hope I can keep growing.

It’s time for me to step back, sit down, shut my mouth, listen and learn and watch as our younger generations remake the world. They will. They have technological skills and imaginations and creativity of which I cannot comprehend.

And the young people are taking away one of my favorite weapons—criticism. I cannot criticize that which I do not understand.

The thing is, changes are happening so quickly we no longer have enough information to simply say, oh, this is good or, oy, that is bad. But change is here, not to stay, but to evolve, to change and change again.

Lucky us, to be on the outside looking in; I say that with my heart in my mouth. To mis-quote Dickens, we live in the best of times; we live in the worst of times.

Mistakes will be made along the way, of course. Like we never made any? That is where the fear comes in, isn’t it?

When it comes to change, I’m aware there is little I can change, perhaps nothing, other than my own attitudes.

The sun comes up. The sun goes down. I wonder if it laughs at us in between times.

——

Sondra Ashton grew up in Harlem but spent most of her adult life out of state. She returned to see the Hi-Line with a perspective of delight. After several years back in Harlem, Ashton is seeking new experiences in Etzatlan, Mexico. Once a Montanan, always. Read Ashton’s essays and other work at http://montanatumbleweed.blogspot.com/. Email [email protected].