On Modulation, Demodulation and Levity

Our modem went black late Tuesday night leaving us with no home phone, no television, no internet connection. A series of calls via cell to the cable provider the next day eventually led to the option of driving to their nearest store (fifty miles away) to pick up a new modem or waiting for a service tech to come Thursday to replace it. With none of the FamilyMtechs available to assist, I took a photo of the hook-ups on the back of the dead modem before disconnecting it, and drove it up to the provider’s store to receive another (in a two minute exchange) and returned home to try to set things to right. Although I eventually managed to get everything up and running again, I felt frustrated and confounded during my attempts to make it through the protocol required to communicate with the provider’s automated attendant, trouble shoot and confirm the problem, and work out the reconnect. Experiences like that with automated help and technology that is almost but not quite beyond my ken, remind me of a scene from the movie, 2001 A Space Odyssey (1968), that’s stayed with me since seeing it for the first and only time fifty two years ago. According to my recollection, it showed a group of primates standing around looking at a large metallic box that showed up in their midst without them having a clue as to what it was, or a tool sufficient to cope with or do anything to it. I feel as clueless as they looked when I don’t have the right key or four digit code (located on the electronic bill I can't pull up) needed to access a system and move forward. Before things went dark, I’d watched a video of Tuesday’s SOTU and the speech-ripping that followed, but missed most of Wednesday's news on the acquittal. Spent part of Thursday catching up and listening to the two speeches Trump made that day, impressed anew by his ability to express direct thanks and recognize support and help received, in a manner that came through as real, personal and appropriate amid a mix of asides and assurances about how good and big and great things are, that to my mid-western ears walks the edge between boilerplate and braggadocio. One of the videos I happened on that heartened me was the Episode 10 podcast of Verdict with Ted Cruz, in which Ted Cruz and Lindsey Graham explained their approach and talked about how they worked together prior to the impeachment vote to relate in a reasonable and personable way with the two senators whose votes could prevent a tie and keep Justice Roberts from getting involved in the politics of the matter. Hearing them speak was a centering experience. What they said made sense. They sounded knowledgeable, positive, credible and invigorated, with levity coming up at the 23:45 mark in the question, “Was there any moment that was or that had some Levity to it, some foibles, some…?”