Bluetooth, Big Brother, and Bradbury

Fahrenheit 451… why didn’t my high school teacher give me this!?

True – the prophetic description of ubiquitous media, bluetooth technology, genetic mapping, wall-sized flatscreen interactive HDTV, impersonal one-day wars, and a host of other uncanny premonitions of a future and fictional America were a bit eerie to read in book published nearly 60 years ago.

Perhaps it was good that I had to wait to “taste” the words of Ray Bradbury, but still… I wish I read it years ago.

But beyond all the elements for which this book is famous, I discover a passage late in the book that meant so much to me. It is, perhaps, the most accurate description of the loss of a loved one I have ever read…

When I was a boy my grandfather died, and he was a sculptor. He was also a very kind man who had a lot of love to give the world, and he helped clean up the slum in out town; and he made toys for us and he did a million things in his lifetime; he was always busy with his hands.

And when he died, I suddenly realized I wasn’t crying for him at all, but for all the things he did. I cried because he would never do them again, he would never carve another piece of wood or help us raise doves and pigeons in the backyard or play the violin the way he did, or tell us jokes the way he did.

He was part of us and when he died, all the actions stopped dead and there was no one to do them just the way he did. He was individual. He was an important man. I’ve never gotten over his death. Often I think what wonderful carvings never came to birth because he did. How many jokes are missing from the world, and how many homing pigeons untouched by his hands. He shaped the world. He did things to the world. The world was bankrupted of ten million fine actions the night he passed on.

– Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury

At least that’s how I have felt.