Ah, the heady days of our civilizational maelstrom.\u00a0 As the world we knew is ripped to shreds and flung around us in centripetal chaos I can recognize fragments of familiar things flying by.\u00a0 Sort of like the images that Dorothy sees in the scene where she is riding in the tornado and sees her friends and relatives float by in a rocking chair or a row boat.<\/p>\n
You recognize some normal American ritual or an icon of a former day.\u00a0 There\u2019s a flash of recognition and it triggers some reflexive emotion or thought.\u00a0 And then it flies by and is gone and the reality of being spun around in a howling cyclone of fragmented bits of the former reality returns.<\/p>\n
But when we\u2019re not fighting for our lives, human beings have to search for the interesting and enjoyable things around them.\u00a0 Even in hell there must be a coffee break where people gather around the water cooler (or battery acid cooler) and shoot the breeze.\u00a0 It\u2019s just the nature of the beast.<\/p>\n
You know I really enjoyed thinking about the minutia in the giant ant movie yesterday.\u00a0 Thinking about the characterizations and the movie conventions that they employed back then was the most fun thing that I have thought about in weeks.\u00a0 And it occurred to me that here is so much substance, so much American-ness in these old silly things from sixty, seventy years ago.\u00a0 And not because there\u2019s great art on display.\u00a0 This is a story about giant ants.\u00a0 Nothing more absurd is imaginable.\u00a0 Nothing less important exists.\u00a0 And yet the people who wrote the script and acted the scenes managed to do a good job of creating this ridiculous world that they were employed to create.\u00a0 The guy who played the booze-soaked hobo in the hospital ward was highly entertaining.\u00a0 The general working with the cop to operate the bazooka for the phosphorus bombardment of the ant nest was amusing in his portrayal of upper management trying his hand at a front-line task.<\/p>\n
Maybe that is what the future looks like.\u00a0 We\u2019ll be like the medieval monks copying and illuminating fragments of the classical world to preserve something for when the rampaging vandals have run out of places to sack and burn and whoever is left sets about the hard work of rebuilding civilization from what\u2019s left of the wreckage.\u00a0 So, I\u2019ve found new direction in celebrating whatever fragments and shards of the old order strike my fancy and even any worthwhile new shoots as they present themselves.\u00a0 Certainly, it\u2019s an uphill battle while the orcs are still busy burning and pillaging all around us.\u00a0 And from time to time, we\u2019ll have to put down our quills and cap our inkwells and pick up a battle axe and shield to fend off the latest incursion of rampaging savages.<\/p>\n
But there is absolutely more sense in celebrating the things that give meaning to life and to enjoy art; high or low, than there is in just bemoaning the destruction and dwelling on how low we have fallen.\u00a0 After all, no one threw a switch one day and ended the dark ages and began the renaissance.\u00a0 The knowledge was always there.\u00a0 It needed people who were willing to apply that knowledge.\u00a0 It needed human ingenuity and imagination and a little breathing space between them and the nearest barbarians.<\/p>\n
So don\u2019t be surprised if I sound a little happier.\u00a0 Sure, the orcs may win this war.\u00a0 Our whole civilization may come crashing down in an orgy of death and darkness.\u00a0 We may be on the cusp of a millennium of ignorance and misery.\u00a0 But as Hurin said in the Silmarillion, \u201c Aur\u00eb entuluva!\u201d, \u201cDay shall come again.\u201d\u00a0 It seems inevitable that human intelligence will persevere over entropy and stupidity.\u00a0 There is in life that which strives against chaos.\u00a0 I\u2019ll bet on us.<\/p>\n
Now, let\u2019s take another look at that giant ant movie.\u00a0 Have you ever noticed how annoying the girl scientist gets when she\u2019s down in the ant nursery in New Mexico?\u00a0 She starts yelling at her colleagues, \u201cBurn it!\u00a0 Burn it all!\u201d<\/p>\n
I mean who the hell is she?\u00a0 Especially since Ben and Bob are going to have to haul her fat butt up several steep inclines by rope to get her out of that cyanide laden death trap.\u00a0 It\u2019s not like she has the upper body strength to get herself out.\u00a0 She could at least act a little more polite.\u00a0 An incipient girl-boss even back then.\u00a0 Ah well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Ah, the heady days of our civilizational maelstrom.\u00a0 As the world we knew is ripped to shreds and flung around us in centripetal chaos I<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,818,1263,4],"tags":[226,1557,1551,3199,872,161],"class_list":["post-20932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-events","category-ocf","category-stuff-that-personally-interests-me-miscellaneous","category-sff","tag-fall-of-the-roman-empire","tag-giant-ants","tag-preserving-old-information","tag-renaissance","tag-societal-collapse","tag-them"],"yoast_head":"\n