A Pattern of Disconnection

Hello Reality,

Thanks for sharing your address. It's a strange practice, writing for people whose face you don't see. To make it feel right it ought to be meaningful... What's the purpose?

My purpose today is to appeal to you, but not the usual you. I'm writing for the part of you that's concerned with how things are happening. Pause and consider for a moment... are you in agreement? If part of you has ever gotten a feeling that something's off, that everyday things aren't happening a way they should, read along.

In this first letter I try to be as clear as I can without alarmism... Things are happening that shouldn't be happening. War, misery, decadence, disconnection, it's hard to come up with a precise list. Is it a sense of injustice? of impotence? It's hard to put a finger on it but it's there, a sense of unease, you're not alone in feeling it.

There's a pattern I would like you to notice: The proximity of people in your home and neighborhood couldn't be more real, yet it's increasingly becoming of a second tier in relation to the people you hold in digital proximity. It's silly because it couldn't be more upside-down... we owe the people in our own city, town, or locale a highest degree of harmony.

What the pandemic revealed was a pattern decades in development, a decoupling of your activities from the local dynamics that give life to the place where you live. Now you live in the Midwest but work for coastal institutions with business overseas, fully severed from your local economy, tethered only weakly through your acts of consumption. Can you see a disconnection?

No one stopped this from happening, in fact we keep moving eagerly in that direction. Working remotely, far away. One would wish it were now widely understood, the ways Technology and the Profit-Motive can separate us from the people and spaces that matter the most. The pattern of disconnection now upon us is facilitated by forces we aren't trained to recognize, it should be a matter of concern.

The weakness of words is they compress everything too much. They can never fully tell you what's going on because to share a feeling they are never enough. For now, I feel content with just bringing the idea to your awareness, that things are happening in ways that shouldn't. Loss of dignity, loss of texture, loss of harmony, what exactly isn't for me to tell. Is this an awareness you possess?

Consider this an appeal to your intrigue and your curiosity. At stake is your ability to notice and counter these dynamics. At issue are patterns in collective behavior developing at a pace impossible to comprehend until it's too late. It's a concern of global proportions that permeates every aspect of life for you and the people you care about. We all, there's something we aren't doing to make sense of the things we do, of how we're spending our days.

Whatever part of you is reading this now, if you can speak to the sincerity and good nature of these words, please stick around and read around. It's a long conversation, possibly endless, but the only way to overcome the patterns upon us is nourishing your ability to appreciate, to pause and ponder. You need to cultivate the awareness, learn to give it a voice. It takes time, be very patient, you'll know it when you have it. May it blossom in you, you'll want to commit to it. And so be it.

Wishing you well, Aesthes