Thursday, September 18, 2008

Is it too late to become Amish?

Y'all, can we band together to form a coalition that could force these United States to have the elections for Prez NOW instead of having to wait another 6 weeks for them to occur?

Because I, like a fair number of folks out there, am officially sick and tired of watching what should be a process of fair exchange of ideas or debate over worthy matters of policy go straight down the shitter. I'm tired of hearing facts get twisted, of reading inflammatory headlines, of suffering through smugness on both parties' sides as they or their hired mouthpieces blow enough putrid hot air to fill a blimp.

Maybe it's just that I dislike politics. In general, I dislike any conflict, so this political season of douchebaggery is a trying time indeed. The preening, the mockery, the ads positioning one person over another, the glossing over of facts or the libelistic yanking about of pseudofacts in order to gain purchase with some heretofore 'unimportant' demographic are not my mental fodder of choice, but the shouting and jingoism can't be shut out, it's simply too far soaked into our 'hooked in' lives to ignore completely.

Perhaps that's the problem. Perhaps being 'hooked in' is the issue. Perhaps creating an atmosphere of complete and total isolation from the influences of electronic society would be the brain-clearing world I crave and so fervently desire.

And so, think I perhaps I should convert to Amishism.

The Amish are a gentlefolk, are they not? They are simple, toil-based, faith-ridden, and solid. They might wear some funny-ass clothes, but hey, I'm getting older now and maybe a caped dress and apron might be a good look for this ol' bod. Plus which? Those snoody things are awesome for bad hair days, from which I suffer on such a regular basis that 'good hair' days are the exception rather than the rule. And who doesn't like a man in suspenders? Really now.

The Amish, at least the sparkly-clean ones that live in my imagination, speak softly and with measure, they tread purposefully through their days, they take pleasure in their chores and in their connection with the earth and their community.

The Amish are, above all, separated from the influences of a constantly available barrage of quips, sound bites, 24-hours 'news,' pabloid glops of political information spooned out by handlers and talking heads. The Amish don't concern themselves with such things, for there is the corn to bring in an a barn to raise with Jakob from down the road. There is bread to bake and children to raise and a baby to feed and the cows to milk, by hand. Then there are the horses to curry-comb and their hooves need shodding (if such a word exists) and there's honey in the hive that needs boiled down (for that is how they say such thing in Amishland, 'boiled down.' They are sparse with their words and so delete the infinitive in favor of a more terse linguistic code).

There are things to do. Work that needs to be completed. There is precious little time left over for fripperies like teevee (which they don't have) or radio (which they probably also don't have, unless it's the hand-cranked kind) or (gasp!) the internet.

Oh.

Wait just a mo. Is there maybe such a thing as hand-cranked internet?

No?

Gah! Plans foiled.

Perhaps some earplugs would work just as well as converting. That way, I'd get to keep my plaid Vans. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't be allowed in Amishia anyhow.

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"Hand-Cranked Internet" would be a pretty good band name. I'mma add it to my list.

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I'm on page 6 of the Dem platform document. It's pretty slow reading, what with all the ire-venting and unnecessary fiddling about on blogs I'm doing.

And how YOU doin'?

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