Complex

I’m embarrassed by the number of articles I haven’t written. I forget the inspiration I want to capture by the time I find a keyboard or scratch paper to scribble down quick notes. I find myself repeating phrases to myself until they just fade away, displaced by the wonder of marvelous items I discover while rummaging around looking for blank paper.

At first I made light of it, trying to fluff off my occasional distractions as normal aging amid a faster, more complex environment that doesn’t allow us time to absorb the constant, unavoidable changes in our daily lives. Changes none of us can escape. Like turning off my daughter's downstairs floor lamp.

In our rush toward an effortless existence, we have siphoned off technological breakthroughs such as sending disciplined energy through space in coherent methods to allow us to communicate with our fearless explorers as far away as the moon. We now use our vastly increasing knowledge to control a lamp I simply don’t want to walk down the stairs to turn off. From the comfort of an overstuffed sofa sitting in front of a colorful wide screen, sharply focused, showing me what happened today in Gaza that shouldn’t have, I ask Alexa to do it for me. I simply have to remember the name of the lamp. Easy. Peasy.

For you, maybe.

“Alexa, turn off the downstairs lamp!”

The light doesn’t flicker, Alexa has not relayed my command. Perhaps she hasn’t heard me.

“ALEXA, TURN OFF THE DOWNSTAIRS LAMP!” Nothing. Darkness is still banished from the downstairs staircase.

I slowly disentangle from the couch and go to the kitchen counter where my granddaughter thoughtfully left a list of Alexa and Echo controllers and their respective subordinates. Yes, they have so many voice activated appliances they have to break them up into families. There are two desk-top lights, but each is assigned to a different controller or else they both come on at the same time. I read the list twice, but the downstairs lamp isn’t on it. The hard part here is I used the lamp last year when we stayed downstairs in the guest room. I used the lamp, by name, for several days, but my memory is as silent as an alligator waiting for a raccoon to wash it’s food at the water’s edge. The raccoon senses danger and backs away, but not me.

“Alexa, turn off the floor lamp!” Nothing. As frustrated as I am, I am determined not to walk down the stairs.

“Alexa, name the lamps downstairs!” The silence is embarrassing.

“Alexa…”

“Here,” my wife says as she hands me a note. “Try this one.”

“Alexa, turn off Bunny Rabbit!” I said. The light emitting from the stair well faded away.

“Where did you find the name?” I asked.

I texted them in Orlando, I needed to hear the television instead of you.”

I read the note again. I swear I’ve never heard the name Bunny Rabbit before. Well, maybe not since last year, anyway.

- George

Modern Cruise Ship - 2023