Dad’s 98th birthday was a good time, and certainly for his kids. We did not go out to dinner, as Dad had hoped we would. He was not feeling energetic enough to do so. Instead, we had a delicious Italian dinner (Buffalo has great Italian food) at home. Most importantly, his wife and his kids were with him, in the house he’s lived in for almost half a century. I think he liked the digital picture frame I gave him although, like so many of these electronic gadgets, it is a bit user unfriendly. Its design is such that navigating the photos and changing settings is much harder than it should be, certainly for an old man. Still, it offers him a slide show of his long life so far; offering him some visual perspective when perhaps his perspective is eroding.
Shauna and I have been spending a lot of time in this little bungalow, making phone calls for Shauna’s business, dealing with insurance companies and banks, talking to our contractors, etc. There hasn’t been a lot of “down time”, and by the time the day is done, after a late dinner, we both retreat to our respective low aerobic activities. In Shauna’s case that might consist of surfing for music on the web or speaking on the telephone to one of her friends. For me, diversion usually consists of a beer, a bad movie, a glance at the newspaper, and/or a few hours of writing. Unfortunately, I have by now seen almost every crappy movie available on HBO, and I rarely watch network television (all my favorite, outrageously trashy reality programs are in reruns); therefore, I have begun to get my jollies traveling on the information highway. I’m not talking about surfing the Net, I’m talking about traveling to distant places. I have become a Google Earth explorer.
For those of you unfamiliar with Google Earth, it is a free service offered by the ever-expanding monster which is Google, and it offers the user the opportunity to employ satellite technology in order to view from above remote parts of the globe. I am told there are similar services offered by Microsoft as well. I simply go to the Google Earth site, where I am asked where I’d like to fly today. I can punch in “Athens, Greece” and with the tap of a key, I am flown to the Parthenon, and from there I can pan out or zoom in to points of interest around the country. I can fly over Palm Springs, California, or zoom in on my parent’s house in Buffalo, view the warehouse of our log supplier in Kamloops, B.C., check out the Sahara Desert … all with the touch of a key. Granted, the satellite imagery might not be as clear as what the CIA has to offer, but in many cases it is very good. Floating over the Aegean Sea, I can get a bird’s eye view of the island of Naxos, where I spent a couple of carefree days in the summer of ‘77, eating and drinking at waterfront café’s, sleeping on the beach, and observing Europe’s elite from a distance. At the time, I was probably worrying about how I would make $13.50 last for three days. In retrospect, those were some of the idyllic moments in my life, which are indelibly imprinted in my long term memory. Funny how certain pleasant memories become enhanced with time.
The other day, a thunderstorm rolled through Burk’s Falls, and for just a moment, the wind blew like a hurricane. Shauna and I thought that the house was going to blow apart. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but when Jasper and I went out for our evening constitutional, I noticed that there were tree branches and lawn furniture strewn about up and down the street. Someone’s T.V. antenna tower had blown over as well. In just a moment, so much can change. I wrote a song about change, three years ago, appropriately entitled “The Wind Begins to Blow”. The last verse reads: “…And time just seems to scatter like the leaves in a blow/So much spinning out of my control/ And I want to solve the problems of this oh so troubled world/But I can’t even seem to solve my own …cho: And the changes they are coming, this I surely know/ And outside, the wind begins to blow”. I’m watching the world change from Google Earth.
-Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2008 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Shauna and I have been spending a lot of time in this little bungalow, making phone calls for Shauna’s business, dealing with insurance companies and banks, talking to our contractors, etc. There hasn’t been a lot of “down time”, and by the time the day is done, after a late dinner, we both retreat to our respective low aerobic activities. In Shauna’s case that might consist of surfing for music on the web or speaking on the telephone to one of her friends. For me, diversion usually consists of a beer, a bad movie, a glance at the newspaper, and/or a few hours of writing. Unfortunately, I have by now seen almost every crappy movie available on HBO, and I rarely watch network television (all my favorite, outrageously trashy reality programs are in reruns); therefore, I have begun to get my jollies traveling on the information highway. I’m not talking about surfing the Net, I’m talking about traveling to distant places. I have become a Google Earth explorer.
For those of you unfamiliar with Google Earth, it is a free service offered by the ever-expanding monster which is Google, and it offers the user the opportunity to employ satellite technology in order to view from above remote parts of the globe. I am told there are similar services offered by Microsoft as well. I simply go to the Google Earth site, where I am asked where I’d like to fly today. I can punch in “Athens, Greece” and with the tap of a key, I am flown to the Parthenon, and from there I can pan out or zoom in to points of interest around the country. I can fly over Palm Springs, California, or zoom in on my parent’s house in Buffalo, view the warehouse of our log supplier in Kamloops, B.C., check out the Sahara Desert … all with the touch of a key. Granted, the satellite imagery might not be as clear as what the CIA has to offer, but in many cases it is very good. Floating over the Aegean Sea, I can get a bird’s eye view of the island of Naxos, where I spent a couple of carefree days in the summer of ‘77, eating and drinking at waterfront café’s, sleeping on the beach, and observing Europe’s elite from a distance. At the time, I was probably worrying about how I would make $13.50 last for three days. In retrospect, those were some of the idyllic moments in my life, which are indelibly imprinted in my long term memory. Funny how certain pleasant memories become enhanced with time.
The other day, a thunderstorm rolled through Burk’s Falls, and for just a moment, the wind blew like a hurricane. Shauna and I thought that the house was going to blow apart. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but when Jasper and I went out for our evening constitutional, I noticed that there were tree branches and lawn furniture strewn about up and down the street. Someone’s T.V. antenna tower had blown over as well. In just a moment, so much can change. I wrote a song about change, three years ago, appropriately entitled “The Wind Begins to Blow”. The last verse reads: “…And time just seems to scatter like the leaves in a blow/So much spinning out of my control/ And I want to solve the problems of this oh so troubled world/But I can’t even seem to solve my own …cho: And the changes they are coming, this I surely know/ And outside, the wind begins to blow”. I’m watching the world change from Google Earth.
-Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2008 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No comments:
Post a Comment