Sleeping through time

A writer-friend posted on Facebook that a barking dog woke her up at 5 a.m. Unable to get back to sleep, she wrote a modern-day story of a Rip Van Winkle type who wakes up after sleeping for twenty-five years. The post led me to ponder what it might be like to have woken up this morning after having been asleep for twenty-five years. What follows is a reflection on what one would have missed.

So, twenty-five years ago would have been May 27, 1989. To fall asleep on May 26, 1989, and to awaken today, one would not know about:

* Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, and the Persian Gulf War that resulted from it.

* The crumbling of the Berlin Wall and the fall of the symbolic Iron Curtain.

* The creation of perhaps two dozen new nation-states, and untold violence that resulted from these changes.

* The complete revolution in how we communicate with each other via technology, whether we're talking about individuals sharing space in a single room or individuals living separately from each other on opposite ends of the globe.

* The election of the first African American president of the United States, and a new surge in democratic participation.

* The massive popularity of hip-hop and its evolution into a worldwide political and cultural movement.

* Electric cars.

* Rises in ocean water as a result of increasing heating of the planet.

* The Tea Party backlash to the election of the first African American president.

* Untold numbers of shootings in elementary, middle, and high schools and on college campuses.

* The increasing -- and logical -- decriminalization of marijuana.

* The validation -- and again logical -- of same sex marriages.

* The fact that people are living longer with such terminal illnesses as HIV/AIDS and cancer, and that treatments are creating conditions where their lives are healthier and fuller.

* The fact that income disparities in this country and across the world put the increasingly sophisticated technologies of health care out of reach for many.

* A revival of personal sustainability in the form of backyard farming, along with the revival of a local farms economy.

* The elevated prestige of cats in the middle class American householder's life.

* Facebook, Twitter, blogs, wikis, and other tools grouped into that category we call social media.

* The rebirth of the newspaper.

* The demise of the pay phone booth.

* ATM fees.

* Dot.coms, bubble economies, and reverse mortgages.

* The creation of the Rock Hall of Fame.

* Self-publishing.

* Cell phones, smart phones, and text messaging.

* Digital photos.

* Cameras embedded into cell phones.

* Fish nibbling treatments to rid the feet of dried skin.

* Compost.

* The efforts by the Bush family to forge a political dynasty.

* Hillary Clinton.

* Amazon.com

* Netflix

* Pay per view, rent on demand.

* September 11, 2001.

* "You're either with us or against us."

* Learning management software systems.

* Online learning.

* Adjunct professors.

* Contractual employment.

* Downsizing.

* Restructuring.

* Junk bonds.

* The global distribution of Starbucks.

* The demise of Frederick & Nelson in Seattle, and the loss of the local Woolworth all over the United States.

* laptop computers.

* Microsoft Word.

* The disappearance of the land line.

* And with it the loss of the dial phone.

* The disappearance of the local telephone book.

* The end of the factory town.

* The demise of job security.

* The gutting of social security.

* The passage of the first significantly progressive federal health care program for all peoples in the United States.

* The idea that one could write 750 words every day on a computer and earn "badges" of merit.

* Massive-open-online courses (or MOOCs).

* Flash mobs.

* Flash drives.

That's a partial list. I'm sure there's quite a bit more.

On a personal level, if I had slept through the past twenty-five years, I would not have bought a house in Seattle, moved to Hawai'i, earned a master's and doctoral degree, moved back to Seattle, and moved to New York. I would not have gotten married, and I would not have had the joy of the numerous cats who brought fur, purrs, and peace to my household post-1989. I would not have run ten marathons, and I would not have tried a triathlon. I would not have leapt out of one career as a journalist into another one as an academic. I often feel as if I do sleep walk through certain aspects of popular culture -- what's hot on TV or what's playing in the cinema, for instance -- but that is because life is busy and full. I do my best to sleep eight hours a night, in order to enjoy that busy-ness to its utmost.