5 things about The People

image lifted from here

1. The Post Office is a startlingly anachronistic thing. I get that not everyone has a computer, and it is still necessary, but it seems all a bit forced to me. Like it's a back up plan being pushed to the forefront. I'm sure I'd think differently were I not electronically connected to the entire goddamn world at all times, and I find the concept of mitigating contact through the barrier of paper appealing, on paper at least, but standing in line to get two stamps seems Beckettian at best. Were I a Better Prepared Person, I wouldn't be in this mess.
   
2. Despite having just paid off a hefty tax bill, the two stamps needed to finalize the process was why I was even there, I think I might be a socialist, or more correctly, an anarcho-socialist as defined by Wikipedia - The People's Definitions. I used to think I might be libertarian, but I find libertarians to largely be wet blankets of privilege recasting their winning status as an idealism. Which is a picture of me, politically speaking. The feeling I get about anarcho-socialism is that we should all take care of each other, lift each other up but not make it our life's work. But again, maybe this feeling stems from my not being Better Prepared Person. BPP's generally eschew concerns for their fellow human because they got their shit covered, where I always keep half an eye on the ground to make sure I don't step in mine.
   
3. And though I am nibbling on this half-baked love of The People, I wish the mass of them newly ensconced on campus would get off the wireless network so Rhapsody would work. I am so ready to be all post-object about music, embracing the technology of license and access when it works, but like any great technological advancement, or system in general, it gets bogged down when people start using it. It explains why BPP's are generally conservative folks who don;t latch on to new things readily.
   
4. Because of this break in the chain, I have been trolling the loosely curated halls of internet radio and while WFMU is always a marked hit or a distinct miss depending on when one lands there, I have been perplexed by Edible Landscapes on London's Resonance FM, a field recording-y week-long gentle stab at a qualitative auditory assessment of what cultures in the North Western hemisphere of the globe might be listening to as part of their daily grind in the built environment. Basically it sounds like someone's phone accidentally dialed you while they sit in a cafeteria. It vacillates between soothing and maddening, but with sine wave smoothness. It's like John Cage's noisy notion of silence, except mediated, chained up. I'll say it is not an unpleasant substitute for listening to precisely what one wants. I'm sure the tape jockeys behind Edible Landscapes would be thrilled with that ringing endorsement.
   
5. The difference between art and subject, though, was deftly illuminated by my experience going to the cafeteria upstairs from the post office. It's crowded with new students and is generally a loud echoey place anyway, but sitting there, mildly bemoaning the breaking of the little connector that allows me to listen to music on my phone through headphones, I was overwhelmed with the din of people in there, and found it oppressive and a little depressing, whereas moments earlier, I found the broadcast of a similar soundscape curious, or at least ponderable. Which is why I temper my declaration of socialism with a "might be" and look with trepidation (and a little envy) at Better Preparedness.