Whoa boy....

Weather here of late has been unseasonably warm. Today however the bubble of summer seems to be bursting; a burst is the foreordained end of a bubble is it not? Westerly winds now blow carrying a cold chill mist in our direction. Gray days in October are merely warning shadows of the dark winter that is to come.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not unhappy. Change from sun to clouds is nothing more than a natural transition. I like snow. I like winter. Still, I truly love fall. What I feel during this period of change is akin to what I feel when a good bottle of wine is gone and an evening with close friends is drawing to a conclusion, affection tinged with melancholy.

Today is Election Day in Canada. 21 days from now it will be Election Day here. As I watch the world shaking I keep thinking back to Pete Townsend’s comment that the old boss will be the same as the new boss. Jaded? Yup. However I do believe change must come. The change may not be the change we are thinking about right here, right now.

An article in the New York Times Sunday talked about food policy and what the changing economic/oil/social situations in the world mean relative to that policy. It is interesting reading. I don’t buy all of it but I think the underlying premise is sound; food wars are possible. Food may well become the new oil if we can get our energy use in order.

And now for the danger Will Robinson part of our story. As some of you who are internet savvy may know, both my wife and I have pages on Facebook. I personally don’t have much truck with Facebook and view it more as a diversion to dabble in from time to time. For all its immersion into popular culture I don’t find that it is providing any meaningful basis of real discourse. The whole status thing part of your profile in which you detail what you are doing at the moment has proved fodder for lots of yuks for me. I am still savoring the sock monkey responsive comments.

On the other hand Francie’s experience today with the same feature was a bit different. At late morning when she decided to check her Facebook listing she found a number of comments that didn’t jibe with what she had last posted her status to be. The tone of the correspondence was concerned and supportive. Uh what is this all about she mused to herself. At that moment she decided to check what it was these folks were responding to. Here it is….

Status “Francie is lying in her bed, wondering what life would be like if she weren't born.”

Ah now the caring and concerned comments began to make sense. However, the comment was not created by Francie. It was at this point she called me. Concerned about improper access to her site she was a little panicked. Sure enough when I went out to the site there were this tidbit in response:

“It would be a world without Primus and Secundus and all that they are poised to give and it would be a world with a miserable JTT, which would certainly be intolerable.”

As we talked about how someone could get access to her page I started thinking about breakfast. In the dark hour of 6:50 a.m. as I was puttering about putting together the family breakfast my 10 year old was busy doing something at the table. Thinking back on it I had assumed he was checking Mom’s recent play lists because on certain music sources the iphone keeps track of what you are listening to. Given his enthrallment with the Postal Service and the Killers I just assumed it was a musically foray.

But no I was wrong. He was busy updating his Mom’s status so that her coworkers when they checked her page would be ready to form an informal suicide watch. Having figure out what had happened Francie was compelled to respond:

“You know, it would have been deep of me - or at least incredibly morose - if I had, in fact written the above status. In fact, my 10-year old son, Loren, was apparently having great fun with my Facebook Ap this morning while playing with my IPhone at the breakfast table. I think he has a much more interesting inner life than I do.”

Okay so once the yuks are gone I am left with a number of questions. First, what do you do with a child like this? I am a limited being and I don’t think play on the chess board of the next few years that will be life with him is in my favor. Second, what is going inside of that head that he would come up with such a phrase and that he would post it on his Mom’s page knowing the reaction it would get from her friends and coworkers? Oh goodness I am in so much trouble. Have they repealed that Nebraska drop off law yet?