Stepping out with Neil Postman

I’ve been “reading” Neil Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death.” I put “reading” in quotes because I’m really being read to — by an audio book “edition.”

I fear, given Postman’s passion for the printed word, that he would have looked down on my being read to. In audio form, his words march inexorably on, offering no opportunity to stop, ponder, re-read, check sources, etc.

So be it. I’ve chosen an Audio Book “edition” of Postman’s indictment of television because it can accompany me on my 10,000-Step hikes. That way I can exercise body and mind at the same time.

Postman is a great workout. Lucid, provocative, glib and insightful.

The introduction to “Amusing Ourselves to Death” offers an example. Here is Postman contrasting the worlds of Orwell’s “1984” and Huxley’s “Brave New World,” and declaring Huxley’s futuristic vision frighteningly close to what we have in the Television (and, I might add, Computer) Age.

“What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban books for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we could become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy… In short Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us … This book (“Amusing Ourselves to Death”) is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.”

As I hike around the neighborhood, iPod buds stuffed in my ears, I’m certain that I am closer to Huxley’s zoned out, somnambulant world. But when I think about the perversions and atrocities of the Bush Administration, its torture chambers, its manipulations of the language, its Big Brother eavesdropping intrusions into our private lives, I’m not so sure.

We may have one foot in 1984 and the other in Brave New World. And we are sinking fast.

Postman, who died in 2003, would no doubt have been pleased that I am here writing, pondering and trying to bring my own understanding to his premise.

If an Audio Book of “Amusing Ourselves to Death” delivered me this point, it’s all to the good.

Destinations

The word “walk” as a noun, as in “I’m taking a walk” or “I’m going out for a walk,” usually connotes leisure or exercise — and nothing more.

Three months ago, when I started the 10,000 Steps program health and leisure were my principal reasons for walking.

Now, partly because the rising price of gasoline, I’ve added a new purpose to my walks — making them my primary form of transportation.

For instance, the other day I was all set to walk to the post office to mail five thank-you notes. But then I looked at the addresses on the envelopes and saw that of the five, three were right here in Hillsdale and a fourth was in Multnomah Village, a couple of miles away. Only the fifth absolutely needed to be posted.

So I decided to hand deliver (hand-and-foot deliver to be precise) the notes. In two of the four cases, I actually found the recipients at home and thanked them personally as well as in writing. They seemed impressed that I would bring the notes in person — and on foot at that. I told them I was happy to do so. Far from being an inconvenience, it was a pleasure.

P.S. Another nice thing about walking is that you don’t expose yourself to parking tickets. See yesterday’s post.

Walking in the Moment

One of the joys of settling into a community is knowing enough people to recognize and greet them on my walks. And on this 10,000 Steps program,I’ve been doing a lot of walking for the past two months, and a lot of meeting.

Instead of measuring walks by steps I should measure them by encounters with neighbors. Today’s walk was a five-neighbor walk, for example. I'm never quite sure whom I will meet, which is part of the fun of it.

Often neighbors who are driving will just pull over to say “hi.” They frequently offer me a lift, but I explain that I have to get my daily 10,000 steps in.

The other thing that has been happening on the walks is that I have been having these oxygenated thoughts. I guess that’s a good description. They are almost little epiphanies.

Today, as I passed a group of pre-schoolers on their way to play in Gabriel Park, I made a point of looking at their faces carefully, trying to imagine each of them as their parents must see them – cherished, wondrous beings.

Twenty children must have filed by me. Each so different and each utterly cherished.

As I passed a fellow walker talking on her cell phone, I also got into the reality of carrying my cell phone with me. I’ve resisted it and rarely use it. But recently I’ve accepted having it with me as part of what it means to be a 21st Century human being. The technology has changed who we are and how we relate to each other.

Isolation is a choice we now must make, no matter where we are.

A final ‘walking’ thought is related to a post ("Time that 'slips off the mind'") from a couple days ago. I had remarked how in our culture fixation on the future consumes the past, while in other cultures the indelible past destroys the future. It is worth adding that in yet other cultures the present – “the eternal now” – is so important, so much the focus of being, that the concepts of past and future vanish.

Seeing the faces of those children, really regarding them one-by-one as they passed me, was such an experience of the moment. A momentous experience.

Final note: This is the first post I have composed on my new Neo. More about that tomorrow.

Following the Yellow Griffin Road

I set out this afternoon to see where these yellow-stenciled street creatures would take me. To make it a quest, I took to calling it “On the Trail of the Yellow Griffins,” for griffins (and yellow) they were. Dozens of them on the streets of our Portland hills and dales.

I linked up with the nearest griffin to me, the one at the bottom of our hill. Its arrow sent me more or less westerly. The marks appeared only when needed, no sooner. Sometimes I’d walk several blocks before seeing one, usually at an intersection. Without the marking, I'd be at a loss which way to turn.

At times during the long intervals between griffins, I worried that my guides had forsaken me.

I had no idea why the griffins and their directional arrows had been stenciled on the pavement. Part of my quest was to discover the reason. At times, when I’d walk several hundred yards without a mark, I’d worry that perhaps the griffins were for some event that had come and gone, its large heraldic banners removed, the lords and ladies returned to their castles.

But then, just as I was about to despair, another mark would appear.

I was on foot, getting in my 10,000 steps for the day, but the markers weren’t on favored bucolic paths. They were always stenciled on the road pavement, seemingly intended to guide cars or bikes or motorcycles.

Most of today’s trek took me in a large loop around the Bridlemile neighborhood. Up past Bridlemile School (and cart-wheeling children in the playground) and Hamilton Park, up through the Fifties subdivision with its rambling “mid-Century classics." The streets were quiet. A friendly, lonely, unleashed hound greeted me with a sniff and a nudge. The steep route delivered me to busy Dosch Road and forced me to walk down along its narrow, dangerous shoulder. The loop ended at Dosch and Hamilton, but another griffin pointed to the route's next leg, up Hamilton on the way to Fairmount via Twombly.

At Twombly, I decided to leave that final ascent for another day. I'd walked nearly three miles.

In my walks elsewhere in recent days, I’ve spotted other yellow griffins, so I know that the continuation route and its makers will send me far from today’s Bridlemile loop.

As I hiked, I imagined a pair of midnight stencilers with their spray paint, marking the way. As I followed their directions, I felt as though I were being reeled in, but to where?

A damsel in distress?

A holy grail?

A cold beer?

Or was their game simply part of the same whimsy that I felt following the path, enjoying a journey that seemed certain to take me back to where I began — to the street at the bottom of our hill, to the perch we call our home?

PS: I asked a couple of days ago (“Two Unrelated Questions") whether anyone knew about the griffins on the pavement. No one has answered, so I'm answering, slowly.

I also quoted part of a speech and asked whether anyone recognized the speaker. Michael Ponder did, citing the most famous reference in the speech: its warning of the military-industrial complex. The speaker, of course, was President Dwight Eisenhower, delivering his farewell address. If you go back to the excerpt, you will see that while Eisenhower holds out hope, he warns of dangers and foibles, which nearly a half century later, persist.