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Where to begin?
I was endlessly surfing the internet when a strange feeling came over me. What if I were to stop? Would the internet suddenly disappear? Would I?
Maybe I would start with the news sites to which I seemed addicted. The Age and The Guardian; Just as an experiment mind you. All I did was surf from unpleasantness to unpleasantness anyway; a rape here, a death there, a war somewhere I've never been; politics at home, death abroad. All awful, appalling, terrifying and annoying. Not a positive emotion among them.
And what about the cartoons? Vague amusement for ten seconds and then neutrality.
The death of the mind is a simple affair, brought-on by constantly allowing dross, distraction, negative emotions and depression to enter our lives. Reality Television gives way to Reality Internet. The immediacy and addiction of being available twenty-four hours a day for your lifetime renders the best of us mindless walking vegetables; unable to exist without the reinforcement from someone, somewhere, that we exist. In the absence of this confirmation, we wither and die...
Some reproduce for that confirmation, but for people like me... no partner, no chance of having a clone of myself, I retreated to the world-wide-web for comfort, and soon found myself caught in its sticky fibres; unable to move, unable to detach...
There are no patches for an internet addiction. No organisations which exist to help you break the cycle of constant and incessant electronic surfing from site-to-site, searching for that elusive... something which will fill the gaping hole in your life.
Until today. A small part, a voice -- perhaps a person or personality which existed long before the advent of the net -- whispered in my mind:
You can be more than this
And as I sit here before the keyboard and the screen, with another awful news article on the screen before me, I heed the voice for the first time.
Perhaps I would have to turn the modem off. That would start things off well. Totally isolate myself from the outside world.
Oh, yes, but there is the mobile telephone. Maybe I should turn that off first?
As I pick the telephone up, it displays the message:
To Unlock press Menu and *
I blink at the grey upon grey screen a moment before pressing the power button for a few seconds. And suddenly, the screen goes blank.
It is as if a sound has stopped in my head, a background noise hitherto unnoticed, only obvious by its absence.
I place the telephone down on the side board and walk calmly across to the modem. Its green lights blink at me momentarily, data being channelled across copper wires to and from my home, and my computer.
The lights dim as I pull the electrical plug from the back of the device; I wince as my exposed skin touches the hot metal base. I hadn't realised how warm these things got.
Now what? I am cut-off from the outside world, unable to communicate with anyone except by land-line or by approaching another human being in the street.
No electronic mail will interrupt my day. No beeping of the telephone will herald the interest of another human in my existence.
I am alone for the first time.
And yet, there is still sound; the television on stand-by. It hums as electricity keeps its circuits warm.
The hum dissipates and disappears, a result of my turning the device off at the wall.
Silence?
No.
I walk into my bedroom: the electric clock-radio is next on the list. The green numbers disappear suddenly as I wrench the plug from the socket.
I feel suddenly as if I am committing a great sacrilege, a crime against which there can be no defense.
I walk slowly through the house, hunting for electronic hums...
Upstairs, the oven is switched-off, electric lights disconnected from the wall; the radio; electric toothbrush; I walk through each room deliberately and callously killing these machines which had -- until now -- been a mainstay of my life. They expire silently and the hum is gone.
Finally, I walk into the garage and flick the switch on the fuse box.
The house is silent. Have I killed it? Surely not; homes existed long before the advent of electricity. I have merely removed something I thought was useful but now is surplus-to-requirements.
The silence is eerie at first. I cup my hands over my ears to see if it is just me, but removing them, I realise the house is silent finally.
I close my eyes and breathe a sigh of relief.
And this now done, I walk back into my room and out of the door, stepping into the air outside. The wind gives the trees a voice, the birds chirp and swoop through the air... the sound of traffic in the distance is not unpleasant, but I am still alone.
Perhaps it will always be this way for me? I have revealed myself to be a subversive, perhaps in need of re-education; certainly rejecting the communication mediums which have been foisted upon me.
I wonder how someone would react if I were to just walk up to them and begin talking?
Would they look at me as-if I were mad? Who am I, they would wonder. Why am I bothering them? Perhaps I am one of those crazy people. Go away, they will say. Leave me alone; I don't want anything to do with you. I don't know you and don't want to.
And I would apologise and go on my way. Perhaps to try talking to another person I have never met before.
I chance a look over my shoulder and back into my room.
It is quiet in there, peaceful... not dead, merely uninterrupted by the hum of electronics. The lifeblood of the house no-longer that of electricity, of circuits, switches and relays. It awaits an energy of a different kind, of human occupancy. To absorb the energies of people living within its walls.
Perhaps I should go back in now and provide that first spark of life.
Northcote, July 2007
Ironically enough, written on a Mac with the aid of the internet and by the light of electricity and with the washing machine whirring in the background.
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