MOVING RIGHT ALONG "Well, who do you think you are?" One of the most liberating things about my Southwestern experience has been living in close proximity to Native Americans. Being around people who don't share the same belief system you grew up with is an excellent way to jump-start awareness of other realities. It's given me a chance to see myself as the different one, the outsider, and that's a real gift. Exciting, too: not because one way of perceiving the world is necessarily better than the other, but because it reminds me that I have a belief system, and that it...can...be...changed. . . For instance, a bird is just a bird, or is it? After reading about the roles of different animals in Indian cultures, I've taken much greater notice of the timing of their appearance in my own day-to-day life. Ravens are considered carriers of magic, messengers from the void, whose appearance can signal changes in consciousness. Well, believe it or not, I've noticed that major insights or epiphanies are often accompanied by the croak of a raven flying overhead. Hawks are considered messengers of the gods who bring answers to important life questions, and it's positively uncanny how often I spy a raptor at the moment a major decision snaps into place. Coyotes, though, are cosmic tricksters, and I've learned to watch out if I spot one after getting all excited about a new scheme or strategy. And I'm talking about significant sightings, not casual ones, like the time a coyote laid down in the yard for the longest time, like an ordinary domestic dog, right after we had decided to lease a big fancy house (the deal came apart that same day!). I could go on and on. Now that I've become aware of these things, I see them happen all the time. Having firmly established my woo-woo credentials for this episode, as well as having planted the idea that what you grew up learning isn't the whole picture, I'd now like to give you a current example of what kind of unspeakable horror can result from a rigid (some would say embalmed) belief system. [drum roll] Yes friends, I'm pleased to further irritate, frustrate, and offend the sensibilities of those who think I should stick to hard drives by reporting what you-know-who* pulled out of his pocket today (Monday, January 29): a so-called "national task force" on energy, chaired by none other than Vice-President Cheney and a cast of oilmen. Right now California is experiencing an extended energy "crisis," which history will probably reveal to have been created intentionally by greedy little men we should have banished years ago. The new administration's opportunistic response to this is, sadly, more drilling for oil and gas and more pipelines! I do think that a court-appointed president who lost the popular election by more than 500,000 votes should be a lot more circumspect when proposing strategies that affect everyone's physical health, quality of life, national heritage, and spiritual well-being. I also think it's an insult to everyone's intelligence to propose a list of "solutions" to the suddenly-discovered energy crisis that omits any mention of conservation or renewable energy sources. What these few are intending to try to sell to Congress is a program to gut environmental protection, allow more drilling (and roads) in national forests and wilderness areas, and subsidize already-rich oil and gas companies in accelerated exploitation of diminishing resources. More drilling will of course only hasten the inevitable, and waiting in the wings to "save" us is the nuclear energy crowd. Closely allied with the new vice-president, their spokesmen are already planting the requisite letters to the editor in the New York Times and other major newspapers. (Take a look if you don't believe me!) Sounds too awful to believe, doesn't it? It's as if a whole busload of bad guys emerged from a time warp somewhere and suddenly took over, treating the rest of us as if the last fifty years had never happened. I never thought I would be able to say this, but the present crew is worse than Reagan's! No matter how wacko the old man was, you could always imagine him sitting on a horse and gazing at a Western vista with a tear in his eye, and that made all the difference. The new guy is a nice enough fellow, but you could be forgiven for thinking he hasn't grown up yet. He hasn't "killed the king" or questioned the orthodoxy of his handlers, and it doesn't appear he even has the depth to comprehend the concept. This is terrible and fearsome stuff, all right. When you kneel down and pray for enlightenment, tell the angels to visit the White House. It can't hurt. Which brings us, finally and circuitously on this trail of belief and consequences, to Apple Computer, or at least its management. I have to think that our man Steve, whom I've given a hard time lately because I know he can take it and because he doesn't give a damn about anything I say, has the capacity for self-examination. I wouldn't admire anyone who didn't. I have a sort of sixth sense about these things, and though I've had great fun bashing the "digital lifestyle" Theme o' the Quarter, I trust the guy. But be careful here: I trust Steve Jobs, the individual, to make his life a splendid work of art through growth and crisis. I am not saying I trust him to carry Apple Computer to ever greater heights of glory, nor should anyone expect him to! Apple is a corporation, not a religion, as I've repeated endlessly to the great irritation of the easily disturbed, and its fate is as a grain of sand in the desert. It's the users, the community of happy souls, who make the Macintosh experience what it is. But can we grow? It just feels to me like we're all stopped up. It's as if we reached the saturation point of ideological correctness long ago. Maybe it's just time to stop paying so much attention to ourselves, I don't know, or maybe to Apple. Then again, maybe it's just me, working through my own angst in the context of writing about these things over the years. I'd much rather save the planet than shareholders, and I can't do either without saving myself first. The glorious thing is that I think I just did, and if I can, anyone can pull it off.       John H. Farr also edits the news for Applelinks.com and invites your comments. The Farr Site Archives will take you to the past three years of columns, though he still hasn't posted an archive for 2001. John also writes a monthly column (not this month!) called "El Emigrante" for Horse Fly in Taos, NM and has just redone THE ZOOZONE . Well, sort of. *(Only 207 weeks to go!) To be notified whenever the column is updated, just send a message titled "Subscribe FSN" to this address.   The FARR SITE is © copyright 2001, John H. Farr, all rights reserved. January 29, 2001 "Moving Right Along" January 22, 2001 "Digital Deathstyle" January 15, 2001 "Gibble Gobble, One of Us" January 8, 2001 "High Desert Satori" January 1, 2001 "Psychic Cats Predict Wild Year Ahead" December 25, 2000 "Christmas in Dubuque..." December 18, 2000 "Merry Christmas, I Think!" December 11, 2000 "Easy Does It, Someday" Farr Site Archives .

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