the way it should be

When moving, it is not unusual to reflect on how one is living her life and dream about the how one will live her life once the transition is complete. I am, in particular, reflecting on the over-bureaucratized nature of modern life.

In the past week, I have had the pleasure of tying up all the loose ends of my life in Toronto. This includes doing my taxes (yay refund!), going to the dentist, getting my eyeglass prescription updated, preparing to sell my shit, having quality time with friends and so on. It also involves dealing with the various bureaucratized entities that dominate modern life. Case in point - fucking cell phones. I'm a smart gal and I know that if I *really* put the effort into it, I could probably figure out my contract. But, jeez, it's a phone, why should it be so hard. As a result of my ignorance, I ended up with an astronomical phone bill, one that nearly took my breath away. Dealing with canceling the internet was similarly frustrating. For a moment (okay for about 24 hours), I felt so trapped by all this fine print. My shoulders ache and I just don't remember feeling so overwhelmed with dealing with the specifics of my life.

I remember when I "launched" out of my parents home. I was so worried about how to manage my bills. The extent of the bills was a landline-based phone, a BGE bill, my car payment, and my rent. None of them had inexplicable hidden fees that required I call the company and be put on hold forever and fight with customer service and so on. These companies rely on people being too busy to check their bills or too frustrated to make the endless necessary calls to figure out all the superfluous charges that they encounter on their internet, cell phone, hydro, and other itemized bills. It's a fucking scam. And it stresses me out to no end.

The thing is, with the internet and phone, much of this is in service of being in constant contact. I'm not entirely sure I like that. I am a pretty anxious person who is prone to being scattered. I don't think I have a diagnosable case of ADD, but I also think that the fractured, confusing nature of contemporary existence does not suit my temperament. Weirdly, I don't know how to stop it. I actually wonder how I used to spend my time before the internet. I want to rethink my connection to connection when I move home. I feel like my life could be so much fuller.

I was listening to a CBC show called "Ideas" about dogs. There was a 3 part series about how dogs think and how people think about their dogs. A growing "concern" among those who think a lot about dog behavior is the way in which people attach to their dogs and relate to them as proxy children. To some dog behaviorists, this is somewhat antithetical to what dogs "need" from their people. One author suggested that the tendency to treat pets like people and to develop serious emotional bonds to pets is somewhat a reflection of the fractured nature of modern resistance. Whereas people used to have community, religion, or extended family to meet their emotional needs, the fact that contemporary life makes many of us too busy to attend to those ways of being fulfilled, people now turn to their pets to gain that contact and intimacy. I see this very much in my relationship with my cats. This is not to say that I want to change the close relationship I have with the animals in my life. This is, however, a concern that I have in the sense that I know I rely on my cats to relieve the pressures of life. I wonder if it's a reflection of the fact that most humans are living their own over-busy lives and we don't connect as fully as we could. I want that to change.