Band of Others

Sometimes I get the feeling that I'm living in a completely different world from the people around me. I suppose this is to be expected when you make a conscious decision to shun the materialistic trappings that so consume our society. Still, it often seems that I'm caught in some sort of a parallel universe.

And the further removed I get from the work a day world, the bigger the feeling gets.

I go to the grocery store and half of the people are walking around talking on their cell phones. It really disturbs me. And whenever I get together with friends, most of them spend at least half of the time checking their smart phones for the "latest" whatever.

I sort of feel like I'm surrounded by a bunch of zombies who have one foot in the land of the living, and the other in some virtual cybernetic netherworld.

It's not that I think all the new technology is bad. I do have a cell phone... a pre-paid one that I only use it a few times per year for emergencies. It's the sense that nobody seems to be interacting with the real world anymore that really gets to me.

And then I turn on the news, and I'm always shocked by the things that are deemed to be newsworthy. Half of the stories seem to be about airline travel, or some stupid thing some celebrity said to draw attention to themselves, or various product announcements. I mean, these days it's sort of hard for me to tell where the news leaves off and the advertising begins!

No wonder people feel dogged by a sense of inferiority and needing to keep up, when they're constantly bombarded with the message that jet setting across the planet and owning the "next big thing" are normal and expected.

And then there's the life-as-competition "reality" TV shows. Seriously, do people really watch this stuff? Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against competitive sports, as anyone who has ever witnessed me watching a Broncos game can clearly attest.

But it's like EVERYTHING is a competition these days. We're all out competing to find the "best" voice, or the "best" mate... I don't even know what any of that means. And even things like traveling and losing weight have been turned into competitions! Talk about taking the societal stamp of approval to ridiculous extremes!

I suppose I've always felt like a bit of a misfit. In some ways it seems like my life is one long string of "other" check boxes.

But I can't escape the sensation that "normal" is getting crazier by the day, leaving me further and further out on the edge.

It's not like I have any desire to move toward the center of the curve, but sometimes I do need a bit of reassurance that I'm not just totally crazy. It always makes me so happy when I can discover another kindred spirit happily living several standard deviations away from the norm.

Anyhow, I know I'm a bit of a blog slut... I write WAY too many comments on people's blogs, and waste WAY too much time cruising the interwebs.

Guess I'm just always hoping to find a "band of others" out there who think the world is as crazy as I do.