IT BOGGLES THE MIND

I admit to being a “gee whiz” kind of guy. I am always amazed by what we can do today and how far we have come in such a short time.

A few years back I wrote of a trip my wife and I took, driving from our then home in Minnesota to Yellowstone National Park. We were driving along the highway which paralleled the same route taken by early settlers headed west in wagons. On that particular day it was pouring down rain and at the same time it was very warm, maybe in the 90s. I became aware that I was traveling at about seventy miles per hour, had my windshield wipers on intermittent, and had my cruise control set, and had my stereo radio playing beautiful music. Of course, we had our air conditioner on as well.

As I was deep in thought about the miracles I was experiencing, my cell phone rang. It was my brother calling, incidentally from his cell phone, while he was also traveling from his home in Los Angeles to the Grand Canyon National Park.

Now, just think about that. Here we are, two automobiles, two thousand miles apart, traveling on the open road, occupied by two individuals having a telephone conversation in real time. It’s enough to boggle the mind. Had one of those settlers on his wagon been able to look over and see us, what would he have thought? I leave that to your imagination.

The reason I recall that event was the storm of this past week. Since moving here to the southern Georgia coast, we have experienced two hurricanes and a named tropical storm. All of that in just the past two years.

In the days before the storms I was acutely aware that the weather was beautiful. The winds were calm and the sun was shining. There was no indication of any storm brewing anywhere let alone just off our coast. The only reason we knew anything was the weather service with their radar and sensing equipment watching the storms and their movement. They knew and reported where the storm was, how intense it was, how fast it was moving and in what direction. We were given ample notice to move inland and thereby suffered no appreciable harm.

Imagine if you were an early American, native or otherwise, who had set up camp on the coast to catch some fish, dig some clams, and otherwise provide for his family. There would have been no way you could have known what was just off the coast until it was too late. I wonder how many died in storms like we have just experienced.  

To coin a phrase, “We’ve come a long way baby.”

I recall my early life. I spent my first few years in a home with no indoor plumbing. We had no running water. We had to run and get it. Baths were taken in huge tubs sitting beside the wood burning stove. They didn’t happen that often either. Water was heated on that stove. We didn’t have a refrigerator. We had instead an ice box. The ice man would come and bring us ice based on the sign we put in the window which alerted him to how much we needed. We didn’t know that wasn’t normal. It is no wonder people died of old age at sixty.   

Look at us today and what we have accomplished in just the last few years. Imagine with me where we will be in the next few years. We may well be like the old settler in his wagon looking over at my automobile. Be happy and glad we have what we have today. We are living longer, healthier lives. And the future, well it boggles the mind.

Ron Scarbro