Living in a Modern Age

Sometimes I wake up on a Sunday morning, start the washing machine, start the coffee maker, heat up some oatmeal in the microwave, get soy milk out of the fridge, turn on the CD player, empty the dishwasher, and stand amazed at the age of machines I live in.

I know it doesn't feel that "space-age" as we go about our days, but it hits me every once in a while that I can push a bunch of buttons and have about seven machines in the house working at the same time, doing things that people used to have to do manually (things that I wouldn't necessarily even know how to do manually now). And that's above and beyond all the machines that are constantly working (fridge, water heater, clock, air conditioning, etc.) without any assistance from me.

These realizations usually come to me early in the morning, when I've just woken up, and my brain is still stupid with sleep, right before the dub music starts playing and the coffee hits my system. A turn of events that I never expected: the sleepy brain knows the pathway to clarity.