Day Ninety-Eight/Image Ninety-Eight

“Afloat” Image. Ceres Gallery. New York. Solo Show.

Tonight I am going to a Holiday business dinner. I imagine these types of parties are going on all over the world at this time of year. Probably on this Saturday night.

My husband is in the transportation business.The people who will be at the dinner are truck drivers.

I am looking forward to it.

I went to one of these parties years ago. I have never been to a event before or since, where I was with a group of such self aware people. The drivers were at ease with themselves and calm. We don’t get to experience calm in people or places anymore.

I have a theory about this. The average person today is under assault all the time. If we are not checking emails, texts or answering our phones in traffic, we are on hold while some obnoxious advertisement for the business we are calling is blasting in our ear. Then the screechy music and “We’ll be right back; thanks for holding.” The loop starts all over again about their business. In our ear. While we are waiting to talk to a more “personal” voice mail of the person we called.

The pharmacy like all other buildings has banned silence. Sixties and Seventies music. (I guess it is assumed that the demographic is the boomers getting their laxatives or prescriptions filled!)

The grocery store now has a quota the checkers have to meet: How loud and fast they can squish the cans of chili into the prebagged lettuce. This sort of thing has given me heart palpitations.

What happened to quiet? People have to go to hot yoga to detox from all the noise and anxiety in our society!

Not so with the truck drivers. They have time, free from incessant head banging, being able to think their own thoughts. They can listen to books on tape! They drive deep into the night, with quiet or noise (of their own choosing.) Contained in their pod. Their eighteen wheeler acts as a space where, although they are constantly aware of everything going on around them on the road, they achieve a sense of themselves that is necessary to their job.

I look forward to being with this refreshing group of people tonight!