Cliff Woffenden, click
here to update your pages on AuthorsDen.
Blogs by Cliff Woffenden
What is Going on? 10/20/2007 1:13:44 PM
Have you ever had one of those days when nothing makes any sense? I have a lot of those.
I have lived most of my adult life in the country, so when I moved into Nelson, a few years ago, I had a very bad case of culture shock. The first day I walked down Baker Street I had this strange attack of “this isn’t real”.
This doesn’t reflect on Nelson in particular. I was thinking there was something surrealistic about all towns and cities. There are a whole lot of things I just don’t understand about why they exist.
We live on a magnificent planet. Everything we need is provided for us. No matter where we live on Earth, there is always enough to clothe, feed, heal and shelter us, even in the Arctic. So, how come we think we need all this other stuff.
Mother Nature is beautiful and accommodating. She may not always act the way we would like her to but she always seeks to have a balance among all her creatures.
What I have a problem with is, why do we struggle so hard to shut Her out? We build towns and cities of concrete and asphault which prevent us from feeling Her earth beneath our feet. We invented electricity so we don’t have to follow Her natural rhythms of light and dark, hot and cold. We create artificial environments that keep our bodies in a constant state of imbalance. We would rather watch shows about nature on TV than to experience its magnificence first hand.
Why have we become so frightened of our Mother? Why is it that we would rather let someone else tell us what to think than to use the brains Mother Earth gave us.
We make synthetic drugs to mask our illnesses and eat “junk food” that has no nutritional value. We cut down our forests with a manic fervor and we pollute our air as if we didn’t need it anymore. It is almost as if we are trying to mutate ourselves into shadows of who and what we used to be.
Humans are a unique species. We have the capacity to create anything we can imagine. Yet, everything we seem to be imagining is contributing to our demise.
Take this computer that I am writing on. I used to scribble my writing on paper. Now I bang it out on this contraption. It certainly costs a lot more to do it this way and there is considerable evidence that I am probably frying my brain cells in front of this screen.
We have completely altered or destroyed entire eco systems just to provide the juice to run our homes, offices and our contraptions.
What I felt like that first day, as I walked down Baker Street, was that I had awakened in someone else's nightmare. I had no idea how I was going to survive in this game when I didn’t even know the rules. Sometimes I don’t even know how I managed to survive for the last fifty two years.
In 1972 I arrived in B.C. and moved into an abandoned tool shed on an abandoned gold claim. I stayed there for five years. Why? Because I had no idea how to play the game. Actually, I had no idea what the game was! I climbed the corporate ladder for eight years because I was told that was what I was supposed to do. One day I woke up and realized I didn’t know why I was doing it. I certainly didn’t like it.
I just didn’t understand our social/ economic/ religious/ political systems. It seemed to me that the whole thing had been designed by mad men.
I was, and still am, confounded by what motivates people, what interests them, the stuff they accumulate, the food they eat and the beliefs they hold sacred.
I have a problem with working for someone so they can profit from my labor and then spend the money on stuff that is contributing to the demise of our species and the planet. I can’t even figure out how I can stop contributing to the madness, myself, without giving up my space on this floating rock.
This is a dilemma I am sure I am not alone in. Sometimes, I can even see the humor in it. But mostly, I am at a loss to explain what the heck I am, or anybody else is, doing here.
I watch the News, people in shops, at work, in hospitals, in churches, driving cars, protesting, cutting down trees, expounding upon their opinions, whatever, and it is like watching a movie that was made on some other planet using some technology that I have never seen before.
Don’t get me wrong. I like it here. I think that, in spite of all the confusion, this planet is the most wonderful, beautiful, exciting places to hang out on. I just don’t understand the species I was born into. You know, the one that seems to be doing everything it can to annihilate itself and everything else on this planet, chasing after the cash to make one more purchase to try to fill that huge black hole in the center of its being.
What is so confusing is I have seen the possibilities, the potential, for humans to be such astonishingly magical, loving, almost angelic, beings. It feels like we have thumbed our noses at our own godliness and replaced it with a plastic replica (“Made in China - batteries not included. Get one free with your next Big Mac).
Now I have retreated back to the country to find some peace of mind, far from the maddening crowds of Baker Street. I can’t say I have found anything that can be imparted to others who are having a problem coping with City madness. I just know my stress levels are way down and although I am no less confused, I am certainly enjoying living on this planet a whole lot more.
So, ‘til next time - if you don’t like the show you’re watching - change the channel (it is perfectly OK, you know!)
More Blogs by Cliff Woffenden • What is Going on? - Saturday, October 20, 2007 • Who’s in charge here? - Monday, October 15, 2007 • What, Me Worry? - Saturday, October 13, 2007
