The Hearth
"A stove used to furnish more than mere warmth. It was a focus, a hearth, a place that gathered the work and leisure of a family and gave the house a center. Its coldness marked the morning, and the spreading of its warmth the beginning of the day. It assigned to the different family members tasks that defined their place in the household. The mother built the fire, the children kept the firebox filled, and the father cut the firewood. It provided for the entire family a regular and bodily engagement with the rhythm of the seasons that was woven together of the threat of cold and solace of warmth, the smell of wood smoke, the exertion of sawing and of carrying, the teaching of skills and the fidelity to daily tasks." (Albert Borgmann: Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life)
So what is our new center? Warmth is now provided in a completely uniform way requiring no demands on our skill, strength or attention. In fact, the warmth device (central heating system) is completely concealed with little more in our sight than the programmable wall console. Maybe our lack of center is one of the troubles in the home ...
Comments
With the microwave we have been distracted with convenience and have lost the appreciation of cooking so we get bad nutrition and bad tasting food. For the glow of the tv we get...well I can only imagine the art, poetry, craft, relationships, friendships, and spiritual awakening's we have lost at the cost of the tv. Not just in the nation, but in the home, no more father playing the guitar to kids after dinner, no more mother telling stories for her children, no more kids reading and drawing there imaginary worlds. I wonder if we would have had Narnia if little "jack" lewis hadn't drawn out all those imaginative pictures with his brother after reading his fathers books. I think we have lost the localized and home based "family" art, poetry, craft, relationships, friendships and spiritual nourishment at the cost of tv. And it's evident in our highly commercialized world...