Technology now allows me to see my family every morning although we are separated by ten time zones. Technology allows me to check out the news, the weather at home and in Jordan, and what the temperatures were in Amman a couple of days ago on Sunday. I have access to my school e-mail, all of my documents, and any line of classic poetry or chapter of classic writing that I want to read through the internet. I am writing less than a dozen miles away from Mt. Nebo where by tradition Moses saw the Promised Land--the land of milk and honey. The biblical catch is that Moses saw the Promised Land, but he himself couldn't enter it.I have seen, felt, and otherwise experienced the promise of the Technological Promised Land, but I am denied full entry into the land of smooth interconnectivity. I can see my family (including our dog Daisy), but my computer doesn't have a webcam so they can't see me. I can upload pictures to this blog, but sometimes it takes five minutes or more per picture. Sometimes it takes five minutes or more and then the operation fails to upload the picture. When I first arrived my blog was all in Arabic, and I had to wait to have Mustafa help me change the pages back to English script. In editing this post, I accidentally deleted the following picture after it took over seven minutes to load...so now it took fifteen minutes to include.
I can see the Technological Promised Land, but I can't enter--not yet. What I can do is read Shakespearean sonnets while I wait for the pictures to load.
Let me confess that we two must be twain,
Although our undivided loves are one...
In our two loves there is but one respect,
Though in our lives a separable spite,
Which though it alter not love's effect,
Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight...
The sonnet's speaker is acknowledging that although he must be separate from his love and that their love for each other remains strong, he is still heart broken and the separation will "steal sweet hours from love's delight."
After reflection, I know in my heart that the Promised Land, technological or real, is a place best viewed, but not entered. While waiting for pictures to upload, I am encouraged to read Shakespeare and reflect on the wind gently moving through the olive trees just outside of my balcony.
In a couple of hours we will have lunch in Madaba, then to the site of Jesus' baptism in the Jordan Valley, and then to floating in the Dead Sea. But, first I must iron my shirt a high level visit tomorrow with University of Jordan officials and an ambassador. Today, I have promised my daughter to bring Buttercup, George Washingtoe and Leon with me to the Dead Sea for swimming. I must go. I have promises to keep. I have promises to keep...
