Images and Thoughts

One of the wallpapers that I have on my PC is an image taken, apparently, by a Depression-era photographer  It is of a woman, very plain, looking through the window of a black car. A small child peeps over the edge of the window. The door of the car is dusty, with dents.The impression I get is tiredness -- the woman, the car, the whole environment.  Just TIRED.

I like the image for a couple of reasons.

For one, it reminds me of how good I have it.  The image comes up on my computer, my personal storage and play device.  When that picture was taken, no one could possibly have imagined a world like this one, where such things were possible.  It would have been magical. And it reminds me that when I get really irritated because, once again, my PC has disconnected itself from my wireless printer, so that, despite the cheerful oh-just-do-this instructions on various web sites (most usually "just uncheck Use Printer Offline, and you will be good to go), I know that I will almost certainly have to turn the PC off and turn the printer off.  I shouldnt have to, and all those cheerful instructions seem to assume that of course I don't have to do that; further, my shaky knowledge of how these things work say the same thing to me, that -somewhere- there is a connection process that happens when the PC starts, and that sets a bit somewhere to say yes, this printer is usable, but something has unset it, and so now you have to go through that process again.  You shouldn't have to, this is a magical world, but guess what, you do.  Live with it

And the picture reminds me of how bad things can get, in our world, how downtrodden people can get, how abandoned they can get.  Which I guess is exactly what has happened.  And it scares me to think how bad it COULD get, with people who are totally oblivous to the world I live in, because my world, my magical world, is as far away from their world as mine is from daily life in Bangladesh. Those people, those powerful, rich people, they could squash my without noticing.  They could.

And they might.