Community – Page 3

Tonight I once again suspended my activities on a large (anti)social media site. I’ve downloaded my account, so I have all the inanities I’ve posted, photos I seem to only have located therein, etc.

The account is deactivated now. Maybe, after some time has passed, I’ll delete it. Who knows?

It’s been an interesting ride, but I’ve been weaning myself for a few weeks, and I’m ready to go cold turkey again. My big concern is that I don’t know how to reach many of the folks I’ve come to be in touch with via the (anti)social media behemoth because that’s our only connection. But I can’t worry about that too much. I am, as they say, in the book if someone’s looking for me, I am not hiding underground.

Card and letter use via the mail has and will continue to increase. It takes more time, and it feels better to stick an envelop in the box on the corner and wonder what may happen – or not – and not have to worry about the interval before someone presses the “like” button. There’s no instant gratification in slow pace of the mails, and waiting around for such a thing creates its own stress.

What with all the hubbub and hoo-hah about the behemoth in recent weeks, it’s time to go. The technology is not evil, but the folks running the company have proven themselves time and again to unconscionably put their own growth and valuation above the impacts on the communities their product touches.

I hope you might consider joining me out here in the empty, less-connected wasteland of the rest of the internet. At the very least, I encourage you to spend less time on social media than you do now. You’ll be a better person for it. I say this with conviction, as I did this once for the better part of a year, and probably would have continued away from the beast but for the onset of life during a pandemic.

It’s served it’s purpose. It’s played me, I’ve played in it, and it’s time to grow up and move on. In the meantime, watch this space…

One advantage to being where we are is a strong sense of community, which is well expressed by having a Community Band. Every Tuesday night over the summer they perform for us in our Central Park. This summer the boy started playing with the band – his school band director will be the new C-Band director, and a few high school players show up each week to play alongside the veterans.

Yesterday was a wet one; kind of unusual for this time of year hereabouts (that’s another benefit of life here – pretty good weather in the summer allowing regular events like this) and so the band, a smaller group of diehards, gathered together under the park’s gazebo for shelter, and began their regular 7pm rehearsal.

It was raining steadily, and Robyn, the night’s conductor, figured they would rehearse then call it a night. And that was the plan, but, sure enough, right at eight o’clock a handful of people showed up for the show.

So they played. It was a shortened performance, but one with heart and gusto. The rain was more of a drizzle, and there were only a baker’s dozen in the crowd, but the bond twixt the band and their audience is strong. The theme was to be Music From The Movies, so this clip is an excerpt from a medley of pop tunes used in Guardians of the Galaxy.

This was to have been Robyn’s last concert; with the rain out, she’ll be back next week with the whole band and much larger crowd, which is appropriate. She’s been in the lives of so many kids for a few years now, as she was the band and choir director at their middle school. So many young lives were touched by her, and by so many marvelous musicians in our community.

We don’t go to as many of these concerts as we should; more now, though, since the Boy is playing in them. Right now is a time of transition, as the old leadership is retiring and new blood is picking up the baton, as well as some of the instruments. It makes me feel good knowing that this institution, our community band, is alive and well, and appears to be thriving, here in the place I call home.

It’s a good feeling on which to be hooked.

Category: Community (Page 3 of 3)

Hooked on a Feeling

Leaving the borg (again)

Hooked on a Feeling