On the Virtues of Manure

I've been thinking lately about something.

There're a lot of interesting new things these days. iPods. Wiis. Worlds of Warcraft. DVDs. DVRs. Computers for working. Computers for fun. Computers in your car so you won't get lost. HDTV. BlueRay discs. LOST. dot.coms. The World Wide Web. There are books to read. So many books to read. Movies to watch. Shows to watch. Songs to listen to. So many diversions. So many ways to entertain ourselves.

I want to build a rock wall.

Seriously. I want to build a rock wall. From the ground up. I'm not certain, but I doubt that the technique one uses to combine rock and mortar in such a fashion as to create a partition probably hasn't changed much in the last 500 years. It seems like it would be pretty basic really, but how many of you know how to build a rock wall?

Or build a house? Or fix your own car? I mean really take it apart and rebuild it? I can't. I can USE my car and I can USE my house. But isn't it odd that for two things that I can USE pretty well, I can't even really begin to tell you how to actually make one. But I guarantee you I can use a computer far more intuitively than I can a saudering iron . . . or even a hammer or a screwdriver for that matter.

Now, I'm not a Luddite. I love my gadgets and, frankly, I'm no more going to stop using my iPod than I'm going to stop using my car. I have a computer-based "thought job," so I don't forsee me stopping using my computer any time soon either but still . . .

So, here's the point I'm coming to: I shoveled manure today and it felt good. I actually cleaned out a horse stall pretty well, and when I was done I refilled it with sawdust. I'm not claiming to have achieved much in the doing, other than simply having felt a little bit better at the end of the day, but I will make a bold statement here: I think that our generation needs to dig around in the shit a little more often. Build something. DO something.