There's "Us" and "Them" but what happened to "Our"

    So, we are back like we left something. I’m in the airport and for anyone that knows me at ALL knows that this is not a new phenomena. I spend so much time in the airport I don’t feel right unless I go through full safety protocol before I do anything. Long story short, being in the airport as we all know is mostly a whole lot of queue’ing (that’s a little British slang for waiting ;-) ). During that time I decided that I going to stop being mindless and get OFF the iPod crack pipe. I know this is a tangent but please just indulge me for the next paragraph or so.

    So why is it that we all feel the NEED to constantly check the iPod. I mean we all see these people on the subways of our cites, in the airports, at the bus stops, eating alone in public eateries, or just walking down the street on their way to meet a friend. They are constantly checking their iPod. I cannot omit that I too am a constant checker. It’s like we KNOW that nothing is changing and the iPod is fine because we are LISTENING TO IT. We’d know if the song changed or the battery died or anything was seriously wrong because the song would change, skip, or go off. I think people just need something to do with themselves when they aren’t doing anything. No one is content with just being on their way. . . The down time just MUST be filled with the arbitrary checking of something even if it is not an iPod it’s a blackberry, or a trio, or their watch, or something. The horrible part is that it’s not a bad idea to be productive during your travel time. You know, catch up on some things and just make your life a little easier by getting ahead when you would otherwise be doing nothing too important anyway. But that’s not what people do. Notice how all the above I mention had nothing to do with anything productive. People check these arbitrary devices as if they are actually doing something that is contributing to their lives and futures, beyond the next stop on the A-Train to Far Rockaway, lol! They have these intensely concerned faces that allude to the idea that what they are looking at on their 1x1.5inch LCD is of the most urgent or important nature. Like if you couldn’t see what they were looking at and somebody asked you to describe what you thought they were looking at just by their expressions you’d naturally say they are reading the stock section of the times, proofing some presentation, or editing some work (all of which you should feel free to REALLY do). The next time you are in transit please look around and notice how many times the man next to you checks his iPod to make sure that he is, in fact, listening to the song that the iPod says he is listening to; because God forbid he is listening to Jimmy Hendrix when he THOUGHT he was listening to Edwin Star! Perhaps you should look up at your own reflection as you check that blackberry for your last AIM notification and notice how introspective and concerned you look at the fact that it took your bff Jill a half hour to respond to the fact that Bob didn’t call you back last night after he said “I’ll call right back.”

Ok so that was my tangent. . .

    So, yesterday I was in the library (you know, the building with all the books in it) and I was looking at something online and this person proceeds to point something out on my screen by actually TOUCHING the screen. Now I don’t really mind too many things, however, I take my computer seriously. Touching the screen or the computer at all is just NOT ok. It’s like asking me to actually take out my earbuds when you’re talking to me. I mean I MIGHT turn down the volume but that’s as far as it goes! So anyway, they saw my expression and immediately withdrew their hand. After a few more moments of looking on the internet and seeing me use some of the pretty cool features on my brand SPANKING new Mac they decided to do something that I recent realized makes white people VERY uncomfortable, they asked “how much did that cost?” I told them and they were taken back that somebody would spend that much on something that can’t give you an orgasm. That lead me to think, “Did the first man to own something think it would become so popular?”

    I mean lets think about this. In the history of people I’m sure that “ownership” was never an innate urge. It’s almost certainly learned. However, I sit here with this computer and all my other things and I feel an almost instinctual urge to claim MY things, MY space, to declare ownership of all these things that I didn’t make, had no hand in making, didn’t shed a drop of sweat in producing, but yet it’s mine because I gave some guy a few pieces of paper and in return he gave me this item? Even still the money that I have I had no hand in printing, creating, or making so how again is it mine? Oh, I know what you’re going to say, “You earned it. You worked for it so it’s yours.” Well to that I say this. If I build a ship and sell it, that ship is the only thing I really have the ability to even argue ownership on. I built it, made it with my own hands. Now, once I sell it it’s no longer mine. But the question is; when I sell it and receive money that was NOT made by the person giving it to me (meaning it’s not theirs in the first place to give since we have established ownership to not merely mean possession) what do I really “have” now? But all of that is a digression. Back to the point that ownership is a crazy idea. . . I mean just look at the history of most of the “brown world” we are all communal. But the FIRST man to own something; how did he explain that to others? Even now, most of your are like “WTF, I mean duh, I own this, that means its mine.” Damn, it just occurred to me that I think I might not want to do this in a Blog. Because where I’m going, very quickly, is to the question of when did the “I” become more important than that “We,” “Us,” and “Our?” That is something that I just cannot transcribe into a digital discourse. However, that is something I think we should take seriously and try to rectify. Yes rectify, as to imply that the action of putting the “I” over the “Us” was an error. I mean the “Us” is different to everyone but regardless of who your “Us” is, they allow you to think outside of yourself and that’s where we are able to truly learn and grow and that should be our true goal in any instance... I’ll leave it there.