Ineluctable modality of stark technological advancement...

---*andante*---

(A hint: The meaning of it all is just this, Technology is our organ of Time, an organ which we, up until the past 120 years or so, have not had, and this is, evolutionarily, very interesting)

It all began with the salutary suggestions and advertisements on Facebook following him. How are they doing it? he would think constantly to himself, more and more paranoid with every knockabout day.

Then the television, and all of its varied channels and outputs, began to exhibit the same thing. Strange parallels. Intelligent, telepathic technology? How is it? How? The television, too?

The feed and the suggestive advertisements on Facebook and the faceless words expurgating and babbling and spillingout on every channel on the telly: what? Yes, they were, mirroring, somewhere, his every thought. He was becoming linked with technology. The singularity bent nearer, nearer, nearer.

He had no clue about the complex and multifaceted algorythms used by the companies whose platforms he was accustomed to regularly using. He had no clue the swirling miasma of ideas and clockwork which he arose from, the rancorous maw of modern life in Los Angeles, were the central reasons for the seeming parallels he experienced within the passing days: his thoughts merely flashing loops like those flashing on the telly, his madness out of the madness, the Madness itself making a mad, little kingmistress from out of its madrib.

He only thought, vaguely but with a confident intelligence, that technology itself was finally beginning its takeover, and that he, since he was a highly sensitive to the softer and higher wares of things, saw himself as one of the main antennae of the human race, and therefor as one of those who picks up on such ominous events as the upcoming Technological Overthrow for the benefit of his fellow man. The poet. The madman. Yes, the madman.

It was all around. It was finally making itself the main thing. Humans no longer do much. Not much to do. Here we go.

He thought about the people in the movie WALL-E, and sighed. He would have to start doing more cardio, maybe.

He remembered the warning he had received, by way of a forbidden book, a few years ago, while staying in the countryside of southern Germany.

It was, as far as his memory could recall, the only example of a real, contemporary forbidden book he had ever experienced for himself.

The forbidden nature of the book came from the request left to all and sundry progeny by the book's progenitor, which was held up by the publisher of the book, rather than the book's existence pushing against any legalities or unwritten laws. It was unleniently and explicitly forbidden by the author, and so, too, the publisher, to sell the book using the internet in any way, shape, or form (there's a secret message there: it's the only and the same one this story wisely outlines). Consequently, sales of the book are immensely scarce and it is immensely difficult to locate if one does not have the select, discreet address.

This book, which can only be bought by mail or in person from a small publishing company located on an island just off of the north coast of Scotland, could be said to be written on the occult. It is a book written by a Rosicrucian. The man in our short story here, our American fellow being followed by the internet and his own television, had, while on a workstay out in Germany in the not-too-distant past, stayed up all night, many a night, reading from the two, violet-colored hardbound volumes of this forbidden book during his time spent in Germany. He read the 3,700 pages or so within just about a week. This was precisely how he learned the German language. Once his day's work was finished -reframing and refinishing old houses- he would start the coffeepot and sigh for four minutes or so out the kitchen windows at the dreamy sunburst of the marvelous German countryside; and once the coffee was ready, he would drink it in the after-sunset twilight and watch the swallows pearl themselves in the wind; and once his coffee cup sipped itself empty, he would go inside and read in the Hobbitlike anteroom until the wee hours of the morning. Such strange histories. Such... such... secrets. It gave the history of Good and Evil. Its perspective blamed Technology for all modern evil, and blamed Francis Bacon for all technology, dearly warning against the use of the Gottfried Leibniz binary code, saying our hearts are biologically and cosmically designed to fulfill us from another plane or dimension, saying the advent of the binary code was the beginning of the end, among other things. The American visitor, reading with continued cognizance and nightly into the night during his German stay, was stunned, enraptured, enthralled. He talked countless hours with the Rosicrucian proprietor he worked for who had lent him the book. The German contractor showed the precocious American carpenter the receipts from his purchase of the book, which had to be done through a friend through a friend through a friend through a friend's mother, and air-mailed. The two men gained a certain friendship with one another. They shared an interest in farming and harvest and gardening rather than masonry. Still, maybe some masonry.

The book, in its histories, warned of the evils of false influence. It listed the powerful Angels of Good, whom we all have on our side. It delineated the history of technological achievements, and labelled the evil impressions and the good impressions. There were only a few good technological impressions.

The book had made such an impression on the American visitor that he, after finishing the second volume late one Friday night, deleted his Facebook, and vowed to rarely use his e-mail.

Months later, after returning home, he made another fresh Facebook, and allowed the return of the small habit of checking his e-mail every hour or so. He forgot all about the two occult volumes.

Then, one morning, strange things began happening. He was typing the word feel into a template, and his MacBook, seemingly, took the care and the time to write the letter "i" before his every attempt to type-in the word feel. Strange. Every attempt: ifeel, ifeel, ifeel, ifeel. Finally, after the twelfth or so attempt, he was allowed, seemingly, to type the word feel as he initially desired, with no i. Strange. The Facebook suggestions were too close. The television's semi-grid repertoire even closer: every time he turned on the television or changed the channel it would throw him deeper into his own locked confusion. So very strange. Very strange, indeed.

---*el fin*---

A note from the writer: Technology is closing in. I have read the book in the story. It exists. The title, I will not say. I will not say anything more about it. I feel it's Technology that should be kept under surveillance.

(Why, that is so strange, the laptop's keyboard here would only allow me to type in the letters f-e-e-l if I typed in the letter i priorly. How strange.)

Perhaps related, perhaps not, is the theme put forth in The Singularity Is Near. I have not read Ray Kurzweil's The Singularity Is Near in toto, but I have skimmed through it. Not good. I mean, MIT's into it, and he's into it. But, no thank you. Not I. Not us.

We cherish our internal revolutions, the sanctity of our circadian beauty, our truthful organicism, our truth of touch. We cannot go deeper into this good night of Technological overrule. Without passing judgement, I, with a sad heart, watch members of my family, friends, everyone around me it seems, fall under the spell of ubiquitous technology. Moreso every day. As a stand to what I see unfolding, I have written the above short story, written in the third person about a man who realized he was having an experience with technology which he did not understand, and which, furthermore, he did not trust at all, whatsoever. A gangrene luddite on the face of All Thriving Technology. He did not trust his own experience. Something was wrong. I wrote about this man, this moment, this American who travelled to Germany, to write into a story all I know about what can happen if we, as modern citizens, active citizens, technologically active, give ourselves over to this way of living. What we give our time to will become us. The singularity is not a thing to be scoffed at. Remember: a nice hike in the outdoors is trident enough to put it all in its place, or my name isn't Pure Grace.

Those I love, the millions, the billions, are entwining themselves, crying, "necessity!" and "must go with the times!" and further, "must become successful!" as they fall under the spell of Technology's vast grip.

We see and distinguish the beautiful, exacting occurrences throughout our lives as they align themselves within the stark but subtle boundaries of certain similitudes and so-called coincidences. These things are as natural and magical as the sunlight, the air, the waggy-tailed leaves. And yet, when we have and share these sacred ranks of experience with each other by way of the caretaker presence of technology, all algorithmic processes and intercessions notwithstanding, there is something that tastes off. It is not to be shrugged off. There is something there. It is invasive. It is to be questioned. It is not benign. It is very, very good at getting in our head. It is very, very good, moreover, at making us think it is nothing, nothing at all. Only subtle algorythms.