Pack Creek Ranch, San Juan County, Utah
Weather warming. green things rising, critters abundant – birds and bunnies and bears are out and about.
April and life flourishes.
BUSH TELEGRAPH
“Plus, ça change, plus c’est la même chose” is the original phrase coined by the French writer and critic, Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr in 1849.
The more things change, the more they remain the same.
It’s an answer to the question: How does word get around?
There’s an old children’s game called Telephone or Chinese Whispers. Children sit in a circle and pass a whispered sentence from person to person around the circle. The final person says the sentence out loud. It’s been changed as it has passed through the circle of children. When adults play this game, the results are the same. And sometimes the final sentence is an improvement on the original sentence.
This points to the nature of gossip, rumor, word of mouth. And the modern use of social media. Just because there is universal use of cell phones doesn’t mean there is a universal change in human nature.
I like the term bush telegraph which I run across in reports from places like Australia and Africa – referring to the mysterious ways information gets passed through drumbeats, and a grapevine of contacts between many people.
I live in a small community in Utah.
The bush telegraph operates here.
Gossip and rumors and fake news abound.
Not always accurate or reliable.
But not always a negative activity, either.
Sometimes the bush telegraph contains good or complimentary information as it passes through from one person to another with the best of intentions because there is as much to admire about human nature as there is to despise.
Thanks to the bush telegraph I know who to call on when my plumbing fails or my car breaks down or I need help of almost any kind. The good word gets around, too.
The more things change, the more they are the same.