Rosemary and I are not living the normal life or retirees who have been married for 50 years. We are mostly in good health and there is sufficient money in the bank for whatever may happen to us physically.

We are not living the normal life of retirees because increasingly being “wired” in this 21^st century brings us instant information (CNN’s breaking news) which since most of it is terrible and illogical it tries our patience for the normal world of our past that we think we understood.

A few years ago when I arrived at a relative’s house from the Buenos Aires airport my relative asked me in Spanish, “How is your black monkey friend doing?” I could not reply and did not. Then I have friends living in that city who are at an opposite side of that spectrum in a fanatical way.

It has been a long time and I have mostly kept my word not to press the buttons of my extreme friends and relatives. I believe that particularly in social media my view or politics and religion are extremely personal. I do not wish to “share” them.

I believe that fanatics from both sides of that blurry middle line are not aware of the meaning of pragmatism. They “share” their views with friends who nod in approval.

I believe that these political, religious and views on female decision on what concerns their body are to be kept personal. Pushing buttons in social media is sort of like demonstrating on the street while being comfortably ensconced in a cozy bed while drinking a latte.

If there is hate in this world to the quantity we have now I believe some of it may be due to these social media evangelists (remember and evangelist strictly speaking is a letter writer).

I turn myself off and never comment. I prefer to think about music, art, literature which since I now mostly read in Spanish I can only self-share.

As an example when I looked at this photograph of Béatrice Larrivé a dancer from Arts Umbrella that I photographed at a Vancouver Playhouse performance in 2015 I think immediately of the people who have passed (performed ) there in all these years I have been in Vancouver. Their presence, since it is in my memory, means that while they may be gone they are there if I look with the effort of remembrance.

I see her as a passionate ghost that I hope will keep the passion of dance so that perhaps in a near future when I turn on my Samsung phone in the morning CNN will not have breaking news that will make my heart flutter in stress.