Take me home country roads (but don't take away my modernity)

Hello friends! This is coming out a bit late on Monday for my liking, but I had a training meeting in EMS today. It involved watching a bunch of people pretending that CPR dummies were actual people, although thankfully they didn't try and harvest any organs like Dwight from The Office.

Seriously some of the training modules we have to study are ridiculous. As an example, here is the fire extinguisher decision training module:

Now I'm just picturing this guy walking into a room, seeing a potentially disastrous fire and just putting his hand on his chin like: "What should I do next?"

Anyways, hilariously bad acting by medical personnel aside, I've been listening to a fair bit of country music this week, whether it was in my car or playing guitar with friends on the porch. As we were singing a round of good ol' John Denver, I got to thinking about the kind of nostalgia that people seem to have for the wide open fields and farmhouses of country life. It's like in Alan Jackson's Gone Country, where all the city folk want to move out and, well, go country. It's often a nostalgia born in ignorance, where we forget how tied we are to the technological culture that seems to have left the farmers and cowboys in the dust.

We seem to have this romanticized idea of the countryside, and that the life of a farmer is more conducive to living a virtuous life. But is that really true? I think, in a certain sense that yes, farming or going out to the countryside can be a spiritual retreat for us. However, I think it's also apparent that staying there requires a great amount of personal sacrifice for anyone who wants to go back to that so-called golden age.

And to be frank, I don't think most people (myself included) are able to let go of modernity that easily. Even after giving up some of my technology for four years at Wyoming Catholic College, I still find myself getting sucked into it and struggling to pursue intellectual things (like this blog).

But my follow up question is this: should we actually try and go on that nostalgia trip and 'go country'? Or should we just reminisce around the campfire and sing songs that glorify the likes of the Virginian, Butch Cassidy and Jim and Jack and Hank while complaining about our normal daily jobs?

Answer: It depends... I think the good ol' country songs by John Denver and Alan Jackson remind us of the good qualities of the cowboy spirit that can be lost in modernity. The first example that comes to mind is Owen Wister's Virginian, who displays the iron blood that won the West and also the gentleman that wins the heart of his Bride.

No! Not that one!

There we go. That's more what I was thinking.

So in short, it seems we need that country or cowboy spirit as a supplement to living virtuous lives in the modern day. While we can't be wrangling cattle or growing crops as a sustenance farmer, we should see those as an example to follow in our work ethic and approach our daily work with the same drive to succeed that these frontiersmen did. You might say that theirs was a battle for survival in a hostile environment, whereas we don't have that struggle. I would disagree, as it seems that basic human virtue is constantly in a battle for survival against the drudgery of the day job. Look up, put a smile on and work hard. That seems to be the thesis for this week.

Whew! That was a long post, hopefully next week will be shorter and will get out in better time than this one did. In the meantime, here's a meme and a joke for your enjoyment. Have a great week and stay happily virtuous!

Speaking of day jobs, I know a lot of jokes about unemployed people but none of them work.

You said it, but at least you became more charitable towards the end...