Michael Harris, The End of Absence (2014)
The Yelp of Yesterday
Harris’ profound book is a wake-up call to those of us “of a certain age.” He points out that at 77 I fall into a demographic that has lived as an adult through both a life with and without the Internet. “If we’re the last people in history to know life before the Internet, we are also the only ones who will ever speak, as it were, both languages. We are the only fluent translators of Before and After.”
The story of my midlife trip around the world, without a phone, seems more important in the light of his observation. No one born today or hereafter can ever take a trip around the world without a phone . . . even if they don’t carry one themselves. So it falls to me to tell the story of what that was like.
I arrived on a night bus from the Phuket airport to the coast side town. I spent my fortieth birthday alone on Kata Beach in Thailand. There were no birthday greetings since I was 3000 miles from home and there was no telephone service of any kind or post office in the beachfront town where I had rented a thatched cottage by the beach. Facebook wasn’t even a twinkle in someone’s eye and there was no such thing as Wi-fi anywhere. Anywhere. On that December 3 day, I watched a sunset break over the ocean so pink and peach and lavender spectacular that I can still remember it. My diary noted that the only person I had spoken to all day was a waiter who brought me grilled fish. I did a small watercolor painting in my journal to commemorate that sunset.
The year was 1982 and I was six months into a trip around the world. I was alone, carrying one small brown suitcase and I was without a phone. It was as close to paradise as I can imagine. The place was actually called Shangri-la, if you can believe it. I was surrounded by solitude, nature and what Michael Harris calls “absence.”
I’m not here as a crusader about the “good old days” to compare the magic of traveling without Yelp or a GPS. Recounting the trip does point out that attention was a more natural exercise without the constant distraction of our devices.
When I wanted to know something, I would ask someone or if the question was factual I would go to a library and stand in front of long rows of wooden drawers filled with cream colored index cards: the card catalogue. These cards, which were carefully indexed by subject, name or author, were just the first step in acquiring what was needed to answer a question. Once a likely book was identified there was the issue of getting the book. Perhaps it was in the stacks above or it may have been housed in another library. I might need to fill out a request for an interlibrary loan, wait two weeks and then return to have a look at the book. When I was able to get my hands on the book then I needed to read it, cull the information, formulate an answer to my query and jot down the findings on some 3 X 5 note cards that I kept in a little green tin box. Research.
No future generation will ever go through this procedure. It would have seemed like science fiction to imagine typing a question onto a computer screen or speaking the question out loud and having the answer appear instantly. Research. Really?
Actual humans were the Yelp of yesterday. As I traveled the world and wanted to know a good place to crash or a reliable bus route or the best local fish I would ask someone I met on the road. Strangers became the links to places, goods and services. I kept a tiny notebook in which I would record recommendations gathered along the way. In Nepal it was the Kathmandu Guest House or K. C.’S Restaurant and on Bali it was Murni’s Restaurant where I’d go to get the scoop on travel tips. I learned to trust the network of travelers I met. On the road to Pokhara I met someone who had just come from there and had a suggestion for a good place to sleep.
The key life skill that was needed was the ability to pay attention to reality, to stay alert to all that was happening and to the people I met and the advice I gathered. Attention became my best friend and the biggest challenge as I traveled.
From my diary of December 5, 1982
“I realized that traveling well takes real alertness, attention, mindfulness and a high degree of tolerance and flexibility. I'm gaining these skills. Spacing out is not allowed. In transit I must stay clear. That's probably why traveling is such real work. There is no time to go slack.”
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