Red light flares up in some distant corner of the night. It moves. I see it pulse and surge. The graph on the other side of the screen bubbles into life, red and orange circles symbolising earthquake activity. Never take the present-day condition for granted. I’m watching a volcano go up, one thousand and eighty-eight miles from my house, live, through a webcam some enterprising sciency Icelanders set up in the region of Bardarbunga. I could be standing on that lunar plane, watching a volcano erupt. Thousands of other people were watching that same feed from that same single device. Maybe this is what we have instead of common culture now. Maybe this is the only reality television some of us ever wanted. To be able to see anything of interest in the world through a window, no matter where we are. Maybe that was the whole point.

 

Reading: The Cunning Man’s Handbook: The Practice of English Folk Magic, 1550-1900, Jim Baker (UK) (US)