Interlude: A day in your life
You are dreaming.
You are dreaming.
“In the world I see, you’re stalking elk through the Grand Canyon forests around the ruins of Rockefeller Center. You’ll wear leather clothes that will last you the rest of your life. You’ll climb the thick kudzu vines that wrap the Sears Tower. And when you look down, you’ll see tiny figures pounding corn, laying strips of venison in the empty car-pool lane of some abandoned superhighway.”
Enter stream consciousness, “Abre los ojos”, you wake.
First rays of the sun spill over your tired face. You roll over to the edge of the bed and grab your smartphone. Getting fed the news you scroll. Cute dog playing a game of thimblerig. You scroll. Travel diaries. You scroll. Spaghetti recipe. You scroll. War. You scroll. The invention of the clock: “The clock has enabled the industrial age. For the first time humans knew when the steam train arrived. Shift work was invented, travel times shortened. Humanity was better connected into a wider economical network.” There is no machine without synchronicity of its parts. There is no algorithm without information exchange. The world is a network and you are the node, a buoys in the ocean pummelled around by surging waves of hype, nudging you away from familiar harbour into the vast cyber space. You should watch Tron again, you think to yourself.
The algorithm makes you laugh as it feeds you another comedy skit. You jump out of bed, into the shower. Water is streaming, a tune is flowing through your brain. Clothes on and you’re out. You run to the subway.
People walking on predefined paths, a flowing river of messenger bags, folded umbrellas, over-ear headphones. Doors closing, smell of sweat and rain. People crushing candy, fed by news, the boredom passes as stations pass as minutes pass.
“Hi, you alright? How was your weekend?” You raise your standing desk, emails streaming down your screen, not in green cyphers. “Hope this email finds you well.” Run to the coffee bar, espresso shot — same as everyday.
Several hours later, “Let me circle back.”, you hear you say. Phone screen is flowing in messages, more work, more feeds, more messages to respond to — you’re in the flow. Black screen, shut down, take work home.
Blink of an eye later you are back in the tunnel. Smell of sweat, rain, afternoon beers. Time is short, you rush, “people who bought Thai food also bought”, order food before you arrive.
“Hi babe, how was your day?”, you go to the kitchen and unpack, Thai Monday. TV, news feed, alert — breaking news, stream of moving pictures, “You’re fired.”. You yawn, you go to bed.
Lights out, you are still up. Eyes open you look into the future, you dream of the day when mixed reality just becomes reality, you are imagining digital possibilities. Blue light floods the room, caresses you to sleep.
You are dreaming.
(Reference of quote at the beginning: Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk. Image created Using DALL-E 3. Text is my own.)
