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Thursday, February 11, 2010

modern love




i am by no means an expert on love, modern or otherwise. i stopped dating eons ago. i continued tricking long after i stopped dating, but ended the tricking phase about mid-point in the crystal crisis. by that time i couldn't focus on much more than staying high and stayinig out of trouble. i was too skittish, even to participate in casual sex. ( i may decide to erase this last sentence because it distracts from this fluffy post)

but it dawned on me this morning as i dredged my brain for a valentine oriented post, i began to think about modern love, juxtaposed to the classic notion of love. naturally, the idea of someone being glued to their terminal or laptop and interfacing and relating to another without much beyond an image(s) comes to mind. the interactions comprising of texts or ims and the typing and continuous addition of letter after letter to form words and thoughts being integral to the communication process. a far cry from the coy smile, tilt of the head, batting of the eyelash, and so on that accompanies those images of old depicting a budding or growing romantic interlude.

but it seems to me that this particular shift in a contemporary snapshot of love is not the only change. culture has also shifted in the way it celebrates and acknowledges the idea of love. while it was once the proliferation of boxes of chocolates and valentines cards and letters, and neighborhood or village dances, we now send messages at lightning speed and to multiple recipients with the push of a button, send goodies and flowers globally with next day delivery before 10am, and celebrate publicly with tens of thousands of others at raves and festivals all over the planet. and all this with the same individual nod to the idea of love, but delivered with a completely global celebratory vibe.



the love parade is a prime example of a modern nod to the idea of love. inspired certainly by the flower powered 1960's america, these celebrations have transformed the rave concept of the 90's. and they have helped solidify not only the long disconnected city of berlin, but helped transform a new interwoven european union. and it was done with the witness of thousands and thousands of participants and onlookers.

no doubt there is partying going on here. and it's not my intent to shine a light on drug and alcohol use. but there is more than that. there is celebration happening. perhaps there is an assimilation of the global village concept here and more importantly there is a public acknowledgement and recognition of some of the most spectacular gifts of the human experience....music and love

love. no matter how intimate the exchange or global the festivus, the feelings and the inner-workings of this spiritually based phenomenon is gi-normous. happy valentines decade....

today's sound choice is a tiesto remix coupled with a german footage of the 2006 love parade.
for my money this captures the wonder and the spectacle that makes up this modern marvel. it makes honest-to-goodness sense that human beings take time to revel, and celebrate life and love, and parade. it definitely makes my heart smile.



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1 comment:

Unknown said...

Is modern love really that different from traditional love? It seems to me that the core is still the same-attraction, pursuit,and interaction. The only thing that has changed are the tools. I think that there may be a plus to the communication via text and email, at least you actually have to communicate with the person; you can't just sit silently like you can on an old fashioned date, saying much of nothing. I wonder too if there isn't a more even distribution of conversation via all of our modern tools. It's harder for one person to dominate the conversation. A very interesting and thoughtful discourse on the nature of love in an age of technology. I enjoyed it.

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