Over the past 15 years or so, I have evolved from someone who spent too much time on Facebook (FB) looking at the inane antics of the world, to a person who dumped in it all in the Fall of 2016, when I began to sense that the entirity of social media had a very dark underbelly.
To put it succinctly, I am now convinced that much of social media culture is gradually eroding the fabric of world society. I am going to spend my time looking for positive alternatives that create more depth in relationships between real humans in personal settings - rather than the distanced and disconnected rantings of somewhat thoughtless hordes sitting behind cell phones and keyboards.
Watchhouse (formerly Madolin Orange) is a music duo that consists of a husband and wife from North Carolina who have been married for about a decade. During that time they have amassed a playlist of quite remarkable music and I have become fascinated with the thoughtfulness and depth of their work.
Their most recent album features, among a mass of other outstanding music, a song entitled "Better Way". This is the most thoughtful and wise musical reflection I know of that ponders the way in which social media can create such division and distance in our lives.
Below is a recent video of this song and another new instrumental work performed in the stunning setting of Red Rocks in Colorado. This music brings tears to my eyes, both by its illustration of loss and brokenness and its hope for reconciliation, along with the gorgeous sounds of this musical troupe. Something mysterious from the past of Americana music with a life-giving note for our common future.
Your laughter echoes in my head
Leave it alone, leave it alone, leave it alone I'm reminded
Don't forget about the dead
Would you be so unkind, so unkind?
You could do all the talking, just speak your mind
Free your mind
And the world stopped to listen
But you had nothing good to say
Now you're alone, digging for bones, buried in your phone for hours
What a waste of a day
Would you be so unkind, so unkind?
You could do all the talking, just speak your mind
Free your mind
I hope you find
I hope you find a better way
To be kinder
