EAST MONTPELIER – We’ve all seen this at one time or another. Russet dry maple leaves raked into a pile for collection, lying quietly, till suddenly a zephyr seemingly from nowhere stirs them into a live, rustling mass. Then a stronger puff takes a whack at them, and the top of the pile lifts in a brief whirlwind that threatens to take all that careful work back to its beginning. In a moment it passes, and the pile is left intact, if a bit disheveled and looking vulnerable.
Here’s a better image for what I’m trying to describe. A somewhat hapless carpenter with a lovely old 110-volt Skilsaw inadvertently plugs it into a 240-volt outlet and starts to use it. It runs unbelievably well, producing a whine at least an octave higher than normal (I watched this happen one day years ago). Then suddenly it blows out a puff of blue-gray smoke and expires with a gruesome death rattle.
What I’m trying to describe is my week just past and its effect on this old man. You’ve heard me complain many times about the ways the advance of technology is passing me by. Every time I kind of get the hang of something, it changes or comes out with a new version, with the explanation and instructions written in a language I would have to be my own child or grandchild to understand.
So I do tend to get a bit behind in various departments, most of which involve numbers. And I guess that after a while it begins to show. An example: I had a feeling that my cell phone, after years of faithful service and two ruinous trips through the steel machinery of my reclining chair, was getting tired faster than it used to, and requiring rejuvenation more often than it had. An astute observation, perhaps, but not quantifiable. My son simply punched a few buttons and came up with results indicating mathematically the need for a new one.
Far off in Arkansas, they could sense my growing discomfiture and increasingly doddering attempts to keep up with the various technical aspects of my life here in the rustic hermitage I call home. So this past week they showed up for a few days’ stay and electronic intervention. One of the main impulses to do it was the increasing cost of my cable television and internet; it was starting to nudge $300 a month. They brought me a new smart TV set for the kitchen (the only place I watch it, during my brief meals), and physically removed the four sets that my late wife used to have on sometimes around the clock. My daughter-in-law is a genius at navigating the often choppy waters of customer service (especially choppy when you want to discontinue a service). She extricated me from $300 down to $105; they stopped on their way back to the airport at the store to drop off the rented hardware; they took down the four old sets from the walls, got on Marketplace, and got rid of them.
We got me a new cell phone, an incredibly complex process which I’d never have had the patience or ability to navigate. They dragged my good lawnmower down from the garage attic, and found it a new home. My motion detector-activated yard light quit working some time ago. My son measured the receiving unit, took its picture, and checked out the cost of a new one.
For several months last year my printer was on the fritz, so I’d been unable to categorize my credit card purchases. A major disruption, which I’ve been struggling for a while to put behind me. My daughter-in-law, who uses the same software I do, but admits that now and then even she has to call on her accountant daughter for help, sat beside me while I fearfully opened my accounts. It seemed almost as though her very presence had frightened my computer into good behavior. It worked! I can’t say that the future looks rosy, but at least I can now see my way clear.
That’s pretty much how the weekend went: one thing after another put to rights. Halfway through it, Bea showed up from Massachusetts, the conversation shifted to a new dimension, and I was free to contemplate the situation of an old guy in the midst of a younger generation. My younger daughter and son-in-law showed up around noon Saturday, as everything was winding down. The conversation really shifted after that. I listened from my end of the table, then silently slipped out of the room, went into the bedroom, and took a much-needed nap.
They’re gone now; the tracker on my phone saw them all safely home last night. Now, like the pile of disturbed leaves, I can face life disheveled, but hopeful again.
Willem Lange is a contractor, writer and storyteller who lives in East Montpelier, Vermont.
