Wassily Kandinski: Mild Process (1928)
"Ah, progress!"

I feel proud to report that I have become a master at another immature technology. Immature technologies seem to find me and I reliably imprint upon them, losing any prior ability to get along without them. I come to depend upon them in symbiotic ardor though they never mature beyond the point where they work in any way reliably. I won't mention the most prominent of these, our ever-humbling internet, for its become too ubiquitous to warrant even a passing mention. Today, I want to explain my relationship with the ever-humiliating weed eater, a garden implement of sorts which has never once so far in its surprisingly long history, lived up to its promise or its promotion. It was a brilliant idea which was apparently never destined to grow into a viable product yet still somehow managed to become ubiquitously popular. Everyone's got one and everyone figures that they're the only one who never quite figured out how to use it. Mastery of such machinery can be tricky because it does not translate into the usual fluid use of it, but demands a more Zen-like acceptance of its inherent limitations. Mastery means accepting such technology for what it is, not what it could never become, and humbly continuing to engage with it anyway.

The weed eater, one of the very few powered tools I allow in my garage, seems simple enough on the surface. A spinning "head" feeds a nylon string out from a small spool. This string, when placed in proximity to something like a weed or some grass, pulverizes it. Trimming around lawn edges, once a chore only managed on one's knees using small clippers, thus becomes a stand-up activity, theoretically accomplished in bare fractions of the alternative time. What might have taken half the morning can, theoretically again, be accomplished in minutes. In practice, the underlying theory goes to Hell, of course, because nylon string is both flexible and remarkably brittle. It breaks easily, though automatic feed technology enables the rotating head to constantly feed replacement line from the spool, sometimes allowing for as long as three minutes of uninterrupted use before one must stop, remove the spool, and carefully rewind onto it a fresh yard of nylon string. In practice, using this eternally immature technology amounts to long mornings spent rewinding the string onto the spool, as each reload lasts just about as long as did every one of its predecessors. Progress might well be much slower than that achieved by any alternative stone-age hand tool, but a sort of blood lust motivates continuing attachment to this more modern method.

With luck, the user advances through the stages where it seems as though the weed eater's continuing failures are somehow his fault to inhabit the more sublime spaces where acceptance transcends fault and blame. There, the continuing opportunity to improve one's ability to rewind spools might become the purpose. The passive acceptance of just what it is becomes the dominant sense, and a jovial sense of the ultimate futility of existence kicks in. How many such jokes does one get to so actively participate in? How few technologies ever approach such levels of absurdity? Grooming the lawn, once the apparent purpose of the user's existence, gets abandoned in favor of a mindful discipline, a blessed withholding of accomplishment. I think of this shift as building my moral character. I'm mentally prepared, as I did yesterday, to lose an entire freshly spooled load of string, an operation requiring about fine minutes of focused effort, in under three seconds AND then sanguinely repeat the process again and again and again. I might have reloaded that spool thirty times while almost accomplishing grooming my modest-sized back yard. I would have finished, but the damned machine broke, providing yet another opportunity for me to practice my budding passive acceptance. The gods were apparently never intent upon supporting my desire to finish grooming my yard.

No sense of failure accompanied this experience. I'd used half a large package of replacement nylon string over the course of the morning and I understand, as with all such immature technologies, that replacement parts will very likely be unavailable at any price. I will be advised to simply discard the broken unit and replace it with a newer model, one which will use a different gauge string and won't be completely compatible with the existing wiring, necessitating the purchase of a whole new set of extension cords which will mostly sit unused in a back corner of the garage. Immature technologies always tout their disposability, though that part of ownership deeply disturbs me. I had mastered this machine before it broke. I had finally caught onto its underlying joke and learned that it had nothing to do with me or my existence, but was rather focused upon broader subjects like gullibility and dedication to past decisions. I once reveled in my yard's rustic appearance. I'd say that I embraced the English Country Garden approach more than the French Formal Garden look. My edges were fuzzy and indistinct and I trimmed the odd offending grasses using an old pair of manual sheep shears. I was primitive in my approach, not up standing with a cord stringing back toward my porch, but I almost remember feeling as if I was my own person then, ignorant of who I might become from the simple application of an immature technology, like when I used to write using pen and paper and post the result in an envelope with a stamp on it. Ah, progress!

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This writing week ends with renewed acceptance. SettlingInto might start with notions of dominance, as if one might prove himself finally capable of keeping up with simple maintenance, but inevitably matures into an acceptable acquiescence. I have not yet gotten around to weeding out the front yard. I tell myself that I'm protecting the blooming tulips, for they are easily disturbed when weeding around them. I've, frankly, begun limiting the lengths of my engagements as I overwhelmed myself a few times with my initial exuberance. SettlingInto seems to settle into a settling for or settling with, when ownership threatens a degrading hubris. I sense that this SettlingInto story has been trying to teach me a fresh humility, as if I might one day accept that I ain't much, but plenty.

I began my writing week writing about writing letters to the editor in FutureTension. "They understandably ache for how it used to be here, though few seem to remember that it was never actually very much like it used to be here, even back then."

In Patriarching, my most popular posting this week, I described the role the fortunate few find themselves conscripted into. "Significance is never transmitted through explicit messages. It infects without employing the obvious."

Finally out in the world again, I noticed a certain replicating pattern still present after more than a year of my absence in Hotel. "Service with remorse, however crocodilian, seems the accepted condition."

I next experienced what I'd thought I'd already accomplished in HomeComings. "I knew for certain where we were going and we were unquestionably going home. A place, not an abstract concept. A presence, no longer an aspiration."

Then I encountered the most common element of our much-vaunted, best in the world Health Scare System in Thwartal. "The Thwartal exists for the apparent purpose of denying users access to it. … Exiting any gauntlet does not inspire reporting problems, it's like that hammer again, finally not whaling on my thumb."

I found myself with nothing to write about so I resorted to self portraiture in WeeHours. "I'm focused upon saying something supporting my unshakable belief that every morning presents something worth mentioning and very likely universal. I do not ever know the significance at first, but scratching at it teases it out."

I ended my writing week shifting my focus in Momenting. "In some ways, modern life works rather like an extended thought experiment where resolutions often lie at scales we can only ever imagine but which work just as reliably as other more physical ones."

I believe that this writing week was in no way exceptional. It was just what it was and just what seemed to show up when I called up my writing genie each morning. Significance pending, as always, I persisted and perhaps even accomplished something. I did catch myself appreciating my absolute mastery of rewinding string trimmer line spools and otherwise remained the fool I probably always have been. Thanks for watching.

©2021 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #SettlingInto, #PureSchmaltz