And it slips through our fingers

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by alatar

the issue with our culture is that we are always looking for the new

Maybe this is down to money. There is little money to be made if we hang on to the past, especially the recent past. Clothing being a case in point - if we all kept our old clothes they would come back into fashion again and we would get more use from them (if indeed we are even interested in such things as fashion at all), recently things seem to come 'in' and 'out' as quickly as every three years. But we are constantly sold 'new' trends and feel we have to buy them, so we have no room for the old things and chuck them out/give them away, only to find that we could have got more use from them.

I'm not talking of Art here - that this develops and changes is a good thing, but even here the pursuit of the new can be harmful. I remember when a new band would spend a few years struggling before they made it big, giving them time to grow and develop; nowadays they are snapped up right away and have burned out by the time their second or third album is released.

It is also wasteful. Both of resources and our own money - and where does that money come from? Our time, which by extension we are also wasting, trying to work a few more hours to earn that latest cool 'thing' instead of having a few more hours to read and think.

Which leads me on to another thing:

Originally Posted by alatar

With our advances we now have time to navel-gaze a lot more, yet on the other hand while we're not out gathering food we have to kill the time doing something, like even posting to forums and such.

Have we really got more time these days? One of the greatest ironies is that with the rise of new technology, from the automatic washing machine to the mp3 player, instead of taking advantage of these tools and giving ourselves more free time, we instead fill up that free time with more work, or we have to work longer to get the next gadget, or even spend time looking after said gadget. It was ironic that as things like automatic washing machines freed women to seek work outside the home, our lives did not become any easier, instead we have ended up with even more work to worry about, more expectations to fulfill. And I wonder how many households now bicker about who's going to fill/empty the dishwasher instead of who's going to wash and who dry?

From this culture comes the logical idea that anything (or anybody? ) old and used is no longer useful. As seen in the Scouring of the Shire - the old Mill is replaced for something much more efficient, and the old smials are dug up to be replaced with new houses. I wonder how long they would have lasted in comparison to the old ones? It would have been no matter to Saruman, as long as the Hobbits had kept wanting the latest 'thing' and paying more money for it.

Now I must go and find my hair shirt after that little rant...