9 March 2012
I had just downloaded an MP3 from the Internet. There it sat on my computer. Just a bunch of bits and bytes. If something happened to my computer, I guess it would be lost forever. I'm not very good at making backups.
Then I thought back to an old friend of mine who died. When we went to his house after his funeral, an entire wall was taken up with cassette tapes. A few were store-bought, but most were bootleg tapes of Grateful Dead concerts. The times and places were scribbled in a faded blue ballpoint ink. A few had added notes like "went with Jesse, Frank, and Sally".
His daughter reminded me that most of the tapes had a few words or comments at the beginning and end of each concert. I realized that my own voice would appear on more than a handful of those tapes, and I vaguely hope I hadn't said anything too silly or embarrassing. She said she was boxing them all up and taking them home. She was looking forward to sharing them with her own children. Now, don't get me wrong. I love the convenience of the MP3's. I love having them on my phones and computers and iPods and clouds. But there's also something kind of sad about it also. I don't doubt that my albums of the Rolling Stones, the Animals, the Kinks, and the Yardbirds will eventually end up on one of my kid's shelves. But as for the MP3s, I get a feeling they will just disappear and universal will reclaim her electrons and never be be thought of again.
Disposable? • Opuss № I