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Constant Reader JW Veldhoen descends from a cloud of post-po-mo' and carefully and thoughtfully responds to my first-of-the-year worries:

"Hey Chris,

Hope things are doing OK. Your post was worrying but bang-on, actually. After six months living in the heart of the world, from my cloistered advantage in Morningside Heights, you wouldn't know it, but it is pretty clear that things won't hold once back in Calgary, where everything is four months slow, all the media to be consumed already vetted by me. Wasting my time on the web, reading, going to galleries, talking... And barely preparing for a future I've spoiled on an embarrassment of riches.

My parents received their property assessment today and the tax they are paying is ridiculous and way out of range the costs of services provided by a city with only a million inhabitants. Or maybe due to the fact there are only a million inhabitants, spread over a space so gigantic that I can't believe it, and idiotically nobody here thinks it is a problem. The effects of an economy with no value for labor. Unfilled condos everywhere and a city planner on the news with blue eyeshadow claiming the success of a relatively slower economy, predicting boom times for the city, rich on oil and gas, ahead. Despite the sprawl, the flab, everything will be fine.

I don't have the heart to tell my folks that I won't keep the house, and they don't want to sell it, so every day I can feel the effect of a disrespect for work, and the humiliation and anger I feel, being powerless to stop it, is profound. So I disagree with you on this notion of unproductive labor and social networking sites. There is the slightest tinge to it, an over-concern for self-promotion, vanity, as compared to the sturdy utility of real world work, and it is as though you believe that if labor is aesthetic, labor is exploited. I don't think so. I think the value of the user far exceeds the corporate imperatives that power sites like Blogger and Facebook, at least for the time being.

Have a good year, in spite of all."
- posted by cjb @ 4:45 PM