Considering what it means to have an online presence today, I wonder if there is effectively something of ourselves that comes across when we write online, sharing an opinion or insight in some forum or another.

Is there something we honestly project as our personal expression, some authentic evidence of a creative identity, looking hopefully to rest properly in another intelligent mind, possibly surviving the slight dendritic pulsings of weary surfers and searchers, too busy, or languishing perhaps, in some far away chair, some near or distant moment of our timeful imagining?

Might we somehow be alive for a brief particular moment in this unknown person's thought? Is this background mulling now an integrated feature in how we reach out, how we attempt to touch each others' hearts, to leave some lasting impression in the mind? Or is this a more creatively primal and preliminary exercise, precursor to our learning to socialize more responsibly at deeper levels, to become more present not only at these multiple distances, but even more, to be present and awake in our communities and homes?

We move so fast, consume so much information, restless to keep up with a world wired already beyond our imagining, chasing a technical culture designed and destined to speed up more each day. How do we maintain our shared humanity, our dignity, our sensitivities to friends and beloveds, to our dearest comrades in this accelerating vortex of transformation that so stirs the pots and begging bowls of our deeper longings?

Do we ask too much of this cyberspace, this virtual commons and meeting hall? Do we expect enough? Too little? Can we gain anything constructive at all, besides witnessing the distraction and breadth that enriches this expanding marketplace of ideas, with clues floating so sparsely across the surging river of tomorrow's commerce? How does one maintain any consistent identity or sanity even, navigating these tides and eddies of continuous change and varied superficiality?

Philosophers have lamented the enormous waste of our throwaway society, something like three or four planets' worth of recycling presently needed to keep up if we all consumed with the disregard of the most indulgent among us. With more countries and peoples 'modernizing' all the time, global warming and such, polluted oceans and all, do we perhaps need some new way of being, not just here online, but in our neighborhoods, in our communities, our relationships; in our commerce, in our politics and diplomatic relations?

Lots of questions to consider. We could spend hours posing more. Weeks and months exploring endless complaints and worries about what we're all doing together, and individually here, to either improve this mess we're in, or frankly, many days, to ignore it. This later option becomes less dignified, less responsible every day that we hesitate to find some better approach to focusing our energies, some more effective use or expression of the gifts we've been given, some more visionary motive to get us through the day.

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