My friend died today.

It was a long time coming.  Too long.  MSA is horrible enemy.  He will be missed.

Sal and I went to the house.  Friends and family were there.  No one really knew what to do except mill about and talk a bit about him.  All of it good, of course.  Which is just as well since there was nothing much left to do.  Not really. He was gone.

Mostly.

I have been in the presence of the deceased before and was always struck by the utter absence of the real person despite the body being present.  This time was different.  It felt as if he was still there.  Somewhat, anyway.

My friend was quite spiritually inclined.  You know, meditation, lots of reading, some groups, eating lentils……no booze or anything…..body-as-a-temple?  And, if one had to choose a ‘category’ of spiritualism, it would be Buddhism. Or Buddhist-like.  Kinda.  He definitely had a Zen thing going on most of his life.   In fact, he was the embodiment of the theme from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (Robt. M. Pirsig).  Even his motorcycle showed it.

Buddhists believe the spirit lingers for four days.  It did feel a bit like that………..

But, for our more earthly and prosaic purposes, he was gone and so, after awhile, we left.

Others were coming in as we were going out.  And sadly, his widow had to deal with that.  As if she didn’t have enough to deal with already.  Even sympathy can be hard to deal with.

And, really, there is nothing to say.  Death comes to us all.  And we all know it.  And it came to him this morning robbing MSA of yet another ghastly endurance test.  In this case, death is a respite.   And that’s the way I am going to look at it.

I saw a website where a couple was quoted, “We are pretty poor and have decided to live off the grid to make ends meet.  Can someone suggest a place?” 

The answer, of course, is that it generally costs a lot more to move off the grid.  If you are poor, it is better financially to stay in the low-rent neighbourhood in a poor city.  Think Detroit.

OK, maybe your ammunition costs go up but food, transportation and gritty reality-type entertainment plays out on a daily basis much cheaper.  Cities can often offer up adrenaline spikes in traffic alone.  Bored?  Go to a demonstration or protest and get tasered, walk a few blocks late at night from your local community centre, stand outside the local emergency ward, get caught in the crossfire between youth gangs.  Move to Surrey.

It’s a rush.

The cheaper cost of living in the city is somewhat offset by the misery and danger but going off the grid is just NOT even remotely cheap.  Well, it might be if someone gives you a house and you can walk to town to shop….maybe.  But, generally speaking, everything is more expensive the further from the centre of the city you go.   Wanna go cheap?  Go urban.

Having said that, that is changing.  Some.  Small towns are getting cheaper to live in.  Overall.  Some are actually desirable places to live.  Especially if you are of retirement age.  The stats indicate that rural life is shrinking and that includes a large number of small towns.  But some small towns are actually growing.

Young people head for the big city and create vacancies of a sort (jobs, housing, activity) in the more attractive small towns.  Local rural industry is shrinking even faster than large heavy urban industry and the effects are showing up in lower small-town house prices.  And housing is a big factor.  Food is more expensive in small centres and so is transportation but small-town housing is a real bargain.  And there may even be a good community to belong to….

And people are noticing.  So much so that, in some places an equilibrium of sorts is playing out.  The housing prices in Courtenay/Comox and Qualicum Beach are actually pretty high by small town standards but still low compared to Vancouver.  Campbell River and points north are very inexpensive.  Small towns in the interior are even lower.  Life is actually getting less expensive if you live in a small town and don’t drive.

But stay on the larger grid.  It is the grid that makes it cheaper.

Craik, Saskatchewan, is one of those desirable places, it seems.  They sold building lots there for a dollar and then made a real effort to foster community.  And they made it a GREEN one as well.  As a result, Craik is a ‘happening place’  to be.  Who woulda guessed?

“Why are you telling us this?”

Because we don’t need to flood valleys or pollute oceans to make a buck.  We don’t have to rape the land, despoil the sea and harvest every living ounce of life off the planet.  We don’t even need bigger bridges, highways and airports.  We can create community and we can sustain it with a considerably smaller impact following something like the Craik model.

And Craik is not unique.  There are many small, resurgent communities working well on the small, sustainable level all over the developed world.  A leading segment in Britain refers to themselves as ‘transitional communities‘.  It is encouraging to read about even if it is hard to actually describe and define.  One thing is for sure: their economies are more local, the people are more engaged with one another and they are proving Green can work.

And it is nice to be able to write about that.

The more I learn, the less I know.  Partly, of course, because I am forgetting stuff (my personal hard drive is full and, apparently, not expandable) but also because I learned to ‘live’ and ‘work’ in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s with a lacklustre foot dragging me into the new millennium.  I haven’t kept up.

I haven’t been a real ‘keener’ on ‘what’s new’  since I was around 50.  Excluding learning about off-the-grid living – it is the exceptions that justify the rationalizations – I haven’t learned a thing.  “I was too busy learning how to chop wood to learn how to use a smartphone!” 

I have one of those cursed smart devices now and I am slowly learning it (mostly because living in the city does not require wood chopping and the TV is the reverse of learning.  It sucks your brain right out of your head.  May as well play around with my phone).

I am nowhere near KNOWING my smartphone but I am learning more and more about how much I don’t know about it.

The other day a friend of mine (my age) saw me talking at my phone and telling Google to call home.  I didn’t dial or punch numbers, I just spoke at the phone.  She said, “Wow, you are so smart!  You can make your cell phone work.  I don’t use mine anymore.  Makes me feel bad.” 

For the record: my phone did not call home.  For some reason I didn’t do it right but I was not about to admit that at that point, now was I? 

“Yes, I know.  They can be intimidating.  Mine still intimidates me (disobeys me is more like it!).  Show me yours.  Maybe we can work it?” 

“Oh, I never carry it anymore.  If I do, people think I should be able to use it so I pretend I left it at home.  I might have it at the bottom of my purse but it isn’t turned on and I forget how to even do that, too.  Let me see.”

She looked in her purse and, after rummaging deep, came out with an old flip-phone.  I tried turning it on but the battery was dead.  I knew why.  It had probably been there for well over a couple of years.

“How long have you had this phone?” 

“Oh, years.  Maybe ten.  Longer, perhaps?”

“The battery is dead.”

“Oh?  Should I get a new one?” 

“Probably not.  This is not a smartphone.  This is the old type that was just a phone.  The new ones are like command centres.” 

“So, that is old technology then?  And I didn’t learn it.  That’s good.  Thank God.  So, if I get a new phone, it will be a smart phone and I won’t have to learn anything…I can just talk at it?” 

“No.  The learning curve on a smartphone is much more difficult than this one was.  My advice is to let a few more generations of phone evolve until they put one out that you just have to talk to.  At the present rate, that should be less than a few years.  They may even just implant it in your head and you won’t even have to charge it up!” 

“Eeeeewh!  I wouldn’t want tubes and wires coming out of my head!” 

“Just a matter of time, sweetie.  Just a matter of time.”    

Seems living off the grid is now illegal in some towns in Florida and a few other states.  People who collect their own rain water, grow their own food and don’t use the electrical grid are being ‘shut down’ by civic authorities. They are being called criminals.

Maybe Sal and I are living on the dark side of the force now, Luke?

Mind you, being on the wrong side of the law is pretty easy if you are poor.  Our judicial system comes down pretty hard on little people who steal a loaf of bread or sleep under a bridge.  Hang ’em high!  Rip-offs on a grand scale get nothing.  Interesting system, don’t you think?

The world is going high-security on shopping centres, office buildings, airports and God-knows-what all (schools, even!) and it has had the effect of making life harder and not in the least bit safer. The people are herded and the advantages accrue only to the 1%. What a system!

Never mind.  It is best to duck under the radar, keep mum on everything wrong and try not to step on the cracks or the cops will break your back screaming ‘Get down!  Get down NOW!’  They might even taser you for good measure.  Bernie Maddof didn’t get tasered.  Hedge fund guys don’t get tasered.  Our Gestapo reserves tasering for mental patients and bums.  So, be careful out there.  Wearing a suit and a tie is now a pro-active defensive manoeuver.  Be safe.  Shine your Florsheims.  Wear a tie.  Think about it.

Fear of authority is now rampant in our society and, what with the taser-thing and the ability to incarcerate, impound and the imposition of soul-breaking fines the average person has been cowed into mousehood.  We are still somewhat short of a ‘locked down’ society (by far) but listen to the hue and cry over gas prices!  Well, there isn’t any, is there?

When oil was $147.00 a barrel the price at the pump was lower than it is today and the price of oil-by-the-barrel is hovering around $100 today.  It is gouging – plain and simple.  So, the country that produces oil charges their citizenry more than the one that does not and that lower-priced country buys from us.  Listen to the outrage!

(squeak)

And Enbridge is going to do that with Natural gas!  Hear the protest!

(half a squeak)

Occupy stood up.  Then sat down.  Idle No More stood up.  Then sat down.  The Port of Vancouver truck drivers are standing up and they will be made to sit down.  The teachers stood up, won in court and are still not gaining traction!  We don’t seem to have much in the way of staying power when it comes to standing up and making our voices heard and, to be frank, I don’t blame anyone for that.  To fight the system means to impose on yourself even more hardship than it is doing to you.  Fighting them makes it worse for you – not better.  And fighting seems to make it better for them!  Ergo, surrender and try to accept what is.  Lie back and enjoy it.

Or, alternatively, you could join the dark side, Luke.  Live off the grid.  Grow your own food.  Catch a fish.  Walk on the wild side.  Literally.  Live where the bears are.

‘Course, you’d be a criminal.  Who woulda thunk it?

Richard Heinberg’s book, the END OF GROWTH, makes a convincing argument as to why the current economic structure can no longer endure. He is systemically speaking, apocalyptic.  He cites plenty of proof but the basic tenet is that you cannot base a financial system on infinite growth when it and everyone involved in it is constrained by a finite planet. And all the eco-lefties agree with him.

I do, too.

When Sal and I decided to move off the grid, it was for many reasons but the main (negative) one was my unease, lack of fulfillment, awareness of a general social malaise or, more simply put: I was getting bad vibes.  Seriously, dude.  I won’t describe all that again (see: past blogs) or all the vibes involved in my discontent.  But the system felt wrong, very, very wrong.  In so many ways.

And, to be fair, environment and ecology was (at the time) among the lesser of the issues that I was worried about.

I remember feeling it fully for the first time when returning from a vacation and finding my self ambivalent at the prospect of more racing with the rats.  It really felt like I was headed for just more of the same ol’, same ol’.  I felt a basic disconnect with the madding crowd and the life goals being popularly espoused (the Maddoff syndrome).

But we came back, anyway.  And I went on an anti-greed rant for a while.  But, ultimately, we just ran away.

And there is nothing wrong with that.

But Heinberg says there is.

“Ultimately, the only thing the individual can do is run away, become more independent, tread more lightly, grow their own food and seek local community” (paraphrased rather than directly quoted).  “And that will fail because individuals will operate on too small a scale. Operating on the big scale requires such radical and universal social and governmental change, and subsequently painful transitioning to a more sustainable model, that we are likely too late and the change needed will be too radical for mass acceptance”.

TRANSLATION: we are all gonna die.

But many great economists have prophesized that scenario many times before and we all seemed to muddle along until the next great recession/depression (usually just around the next corner) came and went, hatching a few more new, brilliant and well-founded doomsday-sayers ready for the next cycle.   We have hit that black wall before.

Heinberg says this is a different kind of wall.  This one is insurmountable. True, it is still just a wall of debt, corruption and mismanagement – like the old days – but it is the last in a series of walls founded on a very wrong premise (pirate capitalism, inflation, inequality, financial leaching, false numbers and the very worst, our accountants do not include the real costs of things – like the gas example described below).  This time the real cost of things (externality costs are the costs to the planet, that big inventory we keep taking from) are going to bite us.

Pirate capitalism has simply taken too much, too fast. This time the warehouse is showing signs of depletion while the air quality we are breathing is dropping, the exits are blocked and the thermostat is out of control.

The END OF GROWTH (Heinberg’s book) suggests it is all happening already but we won’t feel it for a few decades yet.  All you will know is that your standard of living will slowly drop, your taxes, costs and personal restrictions will increase and that, for more and more people, violence will become their default way of expression.

Dave, what brought this on?”

Nothing.  Nothing much.  I think Heinberg is a bit wrong. I think we all feel it already.  OCCUPIERS certainly do.   Idle no more.  Anti-Enbridgers.  And there are lots of them.  My discontent is shared.

I felt it in the 90’s and I was aware of feeling it for sure by the year 2000.  Heinberg must have, too.  I know Lovins and Hawken (Natural Capitalism) felt it. This feeling that the current systems are not serving us and are, in fact, being corrupted is being felt all over the world.

This blog entry is just the logical (or illogical) extension of living off the grid and reading books.  I suppose I could claim some kind of observance capacity, too.  But everyone sees gas prices rising, food prices rising, prices for everything but Chines-made junk are rising and all the time the rich are getting richer, the poor are getting poorer and the planet is becoming less bountiful.  And we are making more consumers every day.  And many of them are pirates rather than good neighbours.  I mean, ‘DUH!’

It is not so much that the problem is not already in our heads.  We all know this stuff – to a lesser or greater extent.  The problem is that our governments and corporations are still going at it.  The old way.  They have blindfolds on.

Worse, they may NOT have blindfolds. They may be acting willfully and with intent because they are planning to continue such destructive ways.

I must admit that the clamp down on freedoms and rights, the increase in censorship and secrecy, the lack of governmental and institutional transparency and the closed-shop nature of governments and corporations today just adds to the suspicion that, if it is not a conspiracy, it is, at the very least a planned separation of the hoi polloi from the 1%.  No one feels like ‘we are all in this together’.  Most people feel left out.

And – open your eyes – the people are being left out.  Small example: They are now proposing to raise Natural gas rates because there has been increased demand over this harsh winter.  As if they made the gas!

The gas at the wellhead is free.  Nature’s bounty.  The actual wellhead has already been paid for, brought into the economic equation at a lesser volume of sales years ago.  Probably already paid for many times over.  Like the gas pipeline.  Any new infrastructure is simply being paid off faster with the greater profits from the greater volume  But there is no extra cost because of volume.  No one is actually manufacturing gas!  The bastards are just billing more! 

Natural gas: it is a free natural product.  Delivery may cost but the gas is free.

Put another way:  So what if there is higher demand?  That justifies nothing.  Only that Enbridge gets to sell more and make more money.  So, why would the price per unit of gas go up?

There is no reason.  Only greed.

And Heinberg and I don’t think that is sustainable.  Because it isn’t.

The real question is: how long will it be tolerable?

Less than two weeks until parole.  We’re being released!  But, like all prisoners incarcerated for any length of time, we have identified with our captors and will likely miss the place.  Somewhat.  I call it being a ‘PUTS’ – post urban trauma syndrome. (pronounced ‘putz’).

The good part: I will spend less on gasoline!

Well, there are many other good things that resulted from our winter foray into the city but I will be immediately aware of the massive drop in fuel use.  OMG!  You think the government takes too much flesh?  The oil companies are pretty damn close in their hoovering of your pockets.

But that is not so much what is on my mind today.  Today I am thinking of Economic Growth and how there won’t likely be any for the foreseeable future.  Economic lassitude is one thing we haven’t really experienced for any length of time.  Not in modern times.

We have had bullish growth and we have experienced bearish recessions but an economy in a state of sameness (status quo) is relatively unknown.  So much of our economic infrastructure is predicated on inflation at the very least.  Interest rates bolster pension funds and that sort of thing.

Howzit gonna  work when there is no growth?

Interestingly, I think, status quo is going to be the BIG change agent. It sounds weird but status quo is the one state that the system can’t cope with.  We don’t have plans for running in place.

Don’t get me wrong – we are not all that comfortable with recessions and depressions either but Wall Street has a maxim: “We make money when the market falls and we make money when it goes up.  When it remains the same, we don’t make money!”   

Status quo is a new game for them and for all financial houses.  How is that gonna work?

And status quo is inevitable.  At some point if not now.  You cannot have an infinitely growing economy in a limited resource world.  That is just obvious.  But, of course, you can’t grow and grow while the resources shrink and shrink either.  Before you run out of room for growth, the limitations are foreseen, some are felt, some are even addressed.  So before we hit the wall, so to speak, we slow down.  And the world is slowing down.

We are running out of oil.  Even if we are not, we are running out of room for the pollution it causes.  And even if we are not, the climate is.  And even if none of that is true, we think it is.  Thus change will happen. And I think status quo, in this case, is change.  Change writ large.

What will status quo look like?  I don’t know but I think that most people see status quo as boring so that boredom will spawn innovation.  In all things.  NOT tomorrow but status quo will eventually morph into some kind of new era.  Economic doldrums could be the calm before the storm.

Anyway……..just a thought………….as Sal and I prepare to head back into the hills, I am looking back at our past few months of modern immersion and wondering where it is all headed.  We are now armed with a smartphone so we can ask it what is going on and we can keep up that way.  “Hey!  Google now…….wazzup?”       

A smidge more than two years ago I wrote about my friend, M, and his battle with MSA, or Multiple Systems Atrophy. MSA is in the Lou Gehrig family – a 100% dysfunctional family.  It is a brutal wasting away.  Over a long, long time.  Horrible.

You need an update.  And this is it:

Now that Sal and I are down here, we visit.

M is still here.  He is still fighting.  He is still losing.

This living sentence makes a life term in prison seem like a luxury vacation.

This is long, hard and cruel.  This is uncomprehendingly painful, impossible and bleak.  And yet both M and his wife, D, live it.  Endure it. Every day.  MSA is terminal and it is equally interminable.  It is way, way too much for anybody.

But, somehow, they are handling it.

I have no idea how either of them remain sane.  That M still has a sense of humour and worries about D and that she is gracious and kind and somehow has enough energy to worry about their frequent guests is nothing short of heroic and the epitome of grace.  Mother Teresa couldn’t have done as well. I can’t imagine anyone doing this well……..

…….maybe Stephen Hawking and his family.

I know M & D.  And so I vote for M & D.  Hawking is second.

That’s how bad this is.

And it is just getting worse.

I won’t go on.  After a point, my writing about it causes me to put myself in M’s shoes.  And I can’t take it.  Not even for the brief time it takes to write a lousy 300 or so words.  Even that is too much for me. I do it only as a tiny tribute to spirit, courage and love at a level I hope I never ever have to know.

But let me leave you with this: give M a thought.  Give D one, too.  And, while you are doing that, love all that you have and ever will have.  Life can be and often is, nasty, brutish and short – but love can and does endure.  I have that on the very best of authority – I see it all the time in my own life but I see it even more vividly when I visit them.

A friend of mine is a contractor.  He reports to a common sense-challenged project manager.  The project manager has read lots of books.  Has degrees.  He knows forms and templates and budgets and Excel and PowerPoint.  He is the boss.

He hasn’t a clue about building.  He’s got paper but that’s it.  Maybe if the construction method was Origami………?  My contractor friend will work with it.  Politely.

Another friend (female) asked me the other day, “I’ve noticed that there really is a grumpy old man syndrome.  Why is that?  Why do guys get grumpy as they get older and why don’t they do something about it?”

She wants the old guys to be nice.

I almost snapped at her.  I was tempted to say that grumpiness is a sign of wisdom.  Things really are annoying!  Most things, actually.

But, I didn’t.  Why?  Because I had gained knowledge on that subject – knowledge born of experience:  Politeness is deemed more important than truth.

The world doesn’t recognize the validity of anger or it’s limp-wristed cousin, grumpiness.  Those two are not nice.  We’re supposed to be nice first.

And we are supposed to be institutionally educated, too.  And socialized.  And civilized.  And tolerant.  Especially, we are supposed to be tolerant!  In a nutshell (exactly!) we are SUPPOSED to tolerate fools gladly and always be nice.

Truth, honesty, common sense?  Maybe listed low on page two………… 

And, in this way, the idiot project manager will be kept safe from the homicidal thoughts of the knowledgeable contractor.  Costs will rise.  Delays will happen.  Etc. Etc.

Can you see where this going?  Put bluntly: many societies have placed politeness and manners ahead of plain-talking truth.  As a consequence the members of those societies are, in effect, liars.  They are, at the very least, unreliable.  You can’t trust what they say.  Politeness – in itself – is NOT true.  The best it can be is PART of truth.  It is not a replacement for it.

In some societies it is systemic.  And they are ‘backward’ as a result. In ours, it is mostly a recent phenomena (I think).  And we are going backwards as a result.

We no longer tell it like it is.

We should.  I am saying that there is a legitimate place for anger and that, for some reason (I think it has economic roots, actually), we are more and more obliged to pretend things are OK when they are not, people are NOT wrong when they are and that procedure and paper will take the place of real knowledge and common sense.

That is wrong.  Yes, you can quote me.

In other words, we may have gone too far in this weird, modern form of civility if it continues to make us unreal, superficial, insincere and ultimately untruthful.  We have to stop reading from the book only.  We have to stop lying about what is.  We have to speak up because not doing so is crazy-making and, ultimately contrary to our goals. 

In the end, truth will out (Shakespeare) so why not employ veracity earlier?

And to do that we have to get past nice as the dominant message.  Sorry.  Truth has to be the primary and dominant message.  Nice is how we wrap it up but first it has to be true.

We all know that truth is not always welcome.  Normal talk: “Oh, your little boy is soooooo cute.  Never mind the mess!”   “No, really.  I want to hear about your day!”  “He’s so much fun!”  She’s just going through a hard time.” “I’ll just be a  minute!” “Your call is important to us.”

Real talk: “Here’s a cloth to clean up his mess.”  “No, thanks, I do not want to hear about your day at the gym or Starbucks.” “He’s nuttier than a fruitcake!”  “She’s just nasty!”  “I will be a long time, why not go get a do-nut?”  “Hang up and try again.  We’re busy!”   

We all know the house will eventually get built.  Despite the project manager’s obstructionism.  Despite my friends misplaced ‘niceness’.  People will still do good work despite political correctness, bureaucratic meddling and catering to the perpetually ignorant or ‘challenged’ (‘stupid’ in the old vernacular).  We will muddle along.  But it would be so much easier if common sense was more common and policy, procedures and political correctness was not.

AND what about the BIG scale?  We all know the media doesn’t tell the truth, politicians care about themselves before the people, democracy is a sham, free markets are controlled by 1% of the people and that our so-called leaders follow the polls and their funding sources like sheep.  We know that climate change is real, the planet is becoming less habitable for life as we know it, we are not addressing our problems and, in a state of unconsciousness, we are actually making them worse.  We all know that – it is not news.

So why do we pretend otherwise?

The truth is that we have problems on all sorts of levels but we have collectively chosen to lie about them or remain ignorant.  Or, in modern speech, we just say gibberish like ‘going forward’ and ‘at the end of the day’, ‘allocating resources’ ‘sit down together’ and ‘plan, study, review and then strike a Royal Commission.’

Why?  What good can come of that?

Long answer made short: anyone who understands that is likely to feel a little grouchy now and then.  Grumpy guys just want the truth.

Despite my overwhelming ambivalence to urban living, there are some surprisingly entertaining moments now and again.

Today I met a guy who – disturbingly – thinks along the same lines as I do and altho that is sufficiently weird in itself, even more oddly, he used similar vocabulary and speech patterns.  As one gets older, one is usually more often defined as being different from others – not more similar.  This was a treat.  65 year-olds at play.

OK.  Richard was better looking (6 years younger) but that hardly counts.  Not to me, anyway.  The waitresses I flirted with seemed OK with my charms, his looks and Larry’s wallet. (Why choose when you can have it all and a 20% tip?)  And anyway, ugly is as ugly does and I like to think I do beautifully.  The two of us plus our mutual good friend, Larry, had a good time at lunch letting our imaginations soar.  And they were soaring green.

“We are entering a transition phase from an oil-based, growth-at-any-costs collective mind set to a more local, sustainable one.  I think everyone knows that.  But what does that transition look like and how do we contribute meaningfully?” 

“Well, I ran away.  Use less gas.  That’s good.  Got older and punch fewer people in the face now.  That’s good.  Went to live off the grid, write letters to the editor and rant about how bad others are. So I do my bit.  And that all kinda keeps me busy enough most of the time.  When I have some extra hours and energy, I build something or hurt myself.  Usually both of those things are accomplished.”

“I don’t wanna be rude but, like, have you ever thought of, like, maybe, you know, expanding your vision or something?” 

“Well, there’s always the basic King of the World-type fantasies, ya know?  Cheap B movie hero transference-thing? Win the lottery?  Get elected, start a rock band; that kind of thing?  That works in the short run for me.  But, practically speaking, I am no longer looking to build the empire.  I am having trouble maintaining it, fixing things, cleaning the gutters.  And I go to bed early.  What were you thinking?”

“I dunno.  Lately, recycling garbage and methane gas generation…….

” I do that.”

“…I meant on an industrial scale, you twit!” 

“Well, if my wife’s opinion counts………..”

“Honestly, I don’t know.  I just think that it is time to look at the world we are leaving our kids.  I think maybe we should clean it up, green it up and lean it up.  Have you read the book Oil Obesity or something like that?”

“Careful now…..we just met”.

“Sorry.  Do you read those kinds of books?” 

“All the time.  I am drawn to them.  They are depressing as hell.  My kinda books.  But they all hold out a glimmer of hope, too.  Change or die is the basic message but change can be fun is the second.  A good one is The Rise of the Naked Economy.  But I also recommend, The End of Growth.  Seems we are also running out of oxygen.  Pretty neat, eh?  But, my advice? You really have to watch some sit-coms in between tomes of doom or your alcohol consumption starts to rise.  Trust me.”

“Shouldn’t we actually be doing something, tho?”

“Like…….?”

“I dunno……………but, ah…….my meter is about to expire.  I gotta go.  We really have to do this again, sometime.  Nice to meet ya!” 

“Yeah…………………..you, too.  If you come up with a game changer, call me.  Leave a message or something.  Or tell Larry….or….whatever………….”

“Yeah, yeah…gotta run…see you guys…..”

“So, I gotta go, too, Dave.  Gotta meeting.  Gotta go.  See ya, Dave.  Good to see you again.  We’ll do this again sometime, eh?”

“I’m in. Whenever.  But you know……….right?

“Know what……………?”

“World’s doomed.  You now that, right?  If it relies on us, we are all toast.”

“Yeah.  I know.  I consider this kind of lunch my charity work for retired guys.  Hope you enjoyed your meal?  Gotta go.”

“I did.  See ya.  Thanks for the donation!”

Given that I have no idea what I am talking about most of the time and that I much prefer to live in the forest so as to preserve that blissful ignorance, it is amazing that I come up with any ideas at all, really. Well, maybe wood-chopping and oyster-collecting ideas might be expected but, honestly, I do all that kinda stuff the old way.  No major deviations when shucking oysters or digging clams for me!

Any original societal or philosophical ideas from me would seem implausible and any new concepts about modern life must be erroneous by definition.  I am not modern.  I am a Luddite.  I am not hip enough to even use my cellphone properly; how can I possibly be right about anything big, modern, international or even interesting for that matter?

But that doesn’t stop me from trying.  Maybe I am a neo-Luddite.  Ideas?  I have a few but then again, too few to mention (sung to a Sinatra melody).   But here’s one: I am not sure but we may now be already ankle-deep in a world-changing revolution.

You’d think we’d know…...?

This might be some kind of global, tech-cum-institutional, climate-altering, nation-wrecking, personal-identity-including shake-up of such colossal proportions that it is happening without us even knowing it.  Better put: I don’t know it.  But I suspect it.

Who ya gonna call?  Certainly none of the institutions we usually rely on for information, that’s for sure!

This question requires a way, way out of the box perspective.

Why?  Because all institutions are, by definition, status quo oriented.  We form organizations to make changes and then we maintain the organization to fine-tune the changes that were made (kept to within the confines of their constitution) which, in turn, solidifies the institution against any major change.  This it remains the same.  It is what societies do.  Repeat efforts until  the institution is hoary and useless.

What do I mean? See education, health care systems, governance, law and traditional allegiances like Masons, Rotary, Religions and even the way war is prepared for (they are always preparing for the last war and the new one surprises everyone.  A good example is today’s cyber wars and terrorism).

Another more personal example: the entire ‘working-for-the-man’ kind of job we have all grown up with, studied for, unionized over and insured against losing (EI) is all a ‘construct’, an institution born from the basic company structure invented hundreds of years ago but whose zenith has likely passed.  More and more people work free-lance, free-form, unstructured, part-time, temporary or on contract.  Or we outsource.  It may not be what we want, but that is the way it is going.

Things change.  And those caught up in such changes are often the last to notice.

Even governments are changing with explosive rapidity these days from the Ukraine to the Arab Spring, from the Canadian Senate to the underground economy.  Speaking of which: Bitcoin, though mortally wounded, was an attempt to change the very nature of the world’s currency. It doesn’t get much more fundamental than that.

Put another way: my nephew recently complained to me that, “…. the %^%$#@! baby boomers are holding on to their jobs thus effectively marginalizing youth and keeping us at home playing video games in the basement”.  His point: the old jobs weren’t there for him.  And, of course, he is right –  often they are not.  Nor will they be there for anyone in another decade or so.

And so my point is this: everything is changing so much that such massive change might meet the definition of a revolution.  Apologies to John Lennon:

You say you want a revolution
We all want to change the world
You tell me that it’s evolution
But when you talk about destruction
Don’t you know you can count me out
You say you got a real solution
 We don’t love to see the plan
You ask me for a contribution
We’re doing what we can
But if you want money for people with minds that hate
All I can tell you is brother you have to wait
You say you’ll change the constitution
We all want to change your head
You tell me it’s the institution
You better free your mind instead
But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao
You ain’t going to make it with anyone anyhow
Don’t you know it’s gonna be alright

Even the definitions of sex, marriage and family are being redefined.  It is all in flux.

I dunno, folks…..the only thing we know for sure is that things change – so that is no surprise.  But we also know that ‘the more things change, the more they remain the same’.  And we can call that the ‘somewhat fluid status quo’.  But that second part may have changed.  It may not remain the same.  When things change on such an epic scale, when institutions from all walks of life crumble and when basic human behaviour seems to be undergoing massive fundamental change even on a molecular level, we may – just may – be on the edge of the revolution we have so often talked about.

Remember: nobody said it would look like we expected it would and, when you think about it, a real revolution never does.  It is totally unexpected.

Could this be it?