A LETTER TO A FRIEND

LETTER TO A FRIEND

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.
© February 2006

BACKGROUND:

My friend was recently mugged and beaten while going on his daily walk. He has done this for years, working his health into fine shape, losing more than 100 pounds.

Now, he is afraid to venture outside the door for fear a gang of youths will attack him again for the mere pleasure of disrupting his life without a thought to the consequences.

My friend lives in a large city, and has worked tirelessly with disadvantaged people for years, quietly, unobtrusively and without a thought of recognition or reward.

He has now sought counsel in a group of others similarly attacked, and a police office talked to them, and was less than reassuring in his platitudinous speech. It was in this mind that my friend contacted me.

Regarding my reference to New Orleans, I was robbed at knifepoint when I was in that city walking back to my hotel after giving a speech to a professional society. This was pre-Katrina New Orleans.

The experience has occupied a place of horror in my consciousness since, and I don't plan to expose myself to that possibility again. So, you see we have something in common. FEAR.

When fear wins, we always lose. The other reference is to a book that I have written on ecology of the mind and environment, now with the title TECHNOLOGY THE NEW RELIGION OF "NOWHERE MAN!"

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It is sad that when things like this happen to us -- the mugging -- that change the pattern of our lives, and we exaggerate the situation as a means of self-protection, that we retreat to a kind of prison.

I'm guilty of it with my attitude towards New Orleans, and you could be of the same mind with regard to your shattering experience. But you are dealing with it and I applaud you for it.

The police officer may not have been reassuring but you were involved in a dialogue with him and the group. It is together we find not only the answer but also the comfort and reassurance of togetherness.

People who have been reading my two parts on the NOWHERE book cannot believe I can't find a publisher. That doesn't mean they are (a) discriminating readers; or (b) would be likely to purchase the book.

NOWHERE seems to be the title of choice along with its connection to "the religion of technology." Those who would comment on it said that "utopian" doesn't mean much to people today, although I think they live in it.

My son's twin boys were one-year-old last weekend, and we were sitting around the table talking about things, and someone mentioned that they were "tired of all this depressing news about poverty in Africa and homelessness in Kashmir (due to the earthquake)."

I said that such an attitude saddened me as most people of the world, more than 50 percent, make less in a year than the typical American makes in a day.

The twins' maternal grandmother, who works part time, said, "Well, I only make about $100 a day, surely they make more than that in a year." I informed her to the negative.

Everyone else at that table including my son and daughter-in-law make several times that amount per day. No one else said a word.

We live in a kind of utopian existence, idealized and sanitized so that it fits our mindset that we can pollute the planet at our will and it will all work out because "technology will find the answer." The president assured us of just that in his State of the Union speech the other night.

A writer at best has very little impact even when he is published. What we like to do once tragedy or disaster or a form of Armageddon hits us is to go back and see whose fault it was and who had warned us about it, etc., etc., etc.

Learning fails to take hold. Katrina will be no different. 9/11 proved that.

We are a hapless people in the jaws of the future seeking perfection without ever being touched with reality. We dance around our problems without ever feeling the need to embrace them. History tells us we are not the first to do this dance, and most assuredly, we will not be the last.

My prayers and best thoughts are with you. As Scarlet O'Hara said, "Tomorrow is another day." And always be well,
Jim