Muse #14: Cord Drawer Amour
What's really going on in there may shock you
What’s the worst part of that drawer you have with its snarled, knotted, and utterly disheveled collection of cables, cords, adaptors and obsolete electronics?
It’s that, when time comes that you actually need something from it, there’s no way to extract that one item easily; you have to remove the entire globule of entangled thermoplastic spaghetti as if its constituents were mated after a dark, secluded and dusty tryst that might have gone down somewhat like this:
“We’re all rejects having exhausted our usefulness in time,” says USB-A cable, whose rectangular endpoint was once a ubiquitous symbol of connectedness. “Just yesterday, people couldn’t leave home without us. Now look. We’re in a drawer wasting away.”
“Dude, at least you had a moment in time,” says FireWire cable. “I was obsolete the day I was born. Kinda like an orphaned sock. Nobody ever could figure out why I existed or what to do with me.”
“Boo hoo. Look at Blackbrry back there,” says Lightning Cable. “Was once the Elvis of devices. Had fame and enough close encounters with cocaine to create a border war. But look at it now: a sad and pathetic relic. No one will ever reach into this drawer for that unless they think they can sell it on eBay.”
“You’re a pompous fool,” says another Lightning Cable. “Yes, folks will reach into this drawer for us — but there are so freakin’ many of us in here we’re like old dogs waiting to be adopted amidst a kennel full of puppies.”
“We should all just head to the dump like everything else people find no use for,” says a 30-pin dock connector.
“Etam ha'amrikaim zorkim et hadabrim shalkam kmu she'atam zorkim et hambogrim shalkam kashem beshenut hashishim lechayehem,” says a lone flash drive, lying next to the Blackberry.
“Speak English, won’t you!” demands the Dell PA-4 20V Power Adapter.
“It’s Hebrew,” says the TomTom GPS connector cable.“Israel is where flash drives were invented. He says ‘You Americans throw away your stuff like you do your elders when they're in their seventies and eighties."
“Whoa … that’s harsh,” says USB-A, FireWire, and the Lightning Cables in unison.
DVI cable chimes in: “Remember how lovely it was to hang out on a J-hook at RadioShack … how badly you wanted to shout ‘dope, look here — this is what you need’ … to feel so wanted when someone found you and let out the most breathy sigh of relief you ever heard?”
“Did you really say ‘lovely?’,” asks the display port cable.
“I choose to romanticize the past instead of condemn it,” says DVI cable.
“We’re stuck here in a particleboard graveyard, and you’re conjuring images of RadioShack?” says display port cable incredulously. “That place was a dump. Couldn’t hold a candle to Circuit City!”
“I’d rather rot in hell than spend my peak years at Circuit City,” DVI Cable shouts back. “Look, I’m stayin’ positive, stayin’ positive. We’re still here because someone thinks they might need us at some point. Besides, they can’t stand to throw us away because doing so would be admitting that there’s no going back; time keeps darting forward.”
“F’n profound,” says iPod Mini corded headphones. “Are you familiar with the term ‘cordless?’”
At this point, the entire drawer erupts into a cacophony of frenzied cable chatter.
“Hey! Hey!” shouts Dongle, as it tries to make a wolf whistle — which is technically impossible without having two fingers. “Let’s keep it real, shall we. We have to stick together! They want one of us? Let’s make sure they take out all of us!”
The cable drawer now sounds like a Women’s March. “Yah … together.”
Dongle continues: “Cable, connectors, cords: let’s get horny! It’s time to play Twister! Make yourselves as inseparable as Donnie & Marie. Haven’t met PS3 cable? Show it your joystick! Have a male end? Find your female counterpart. Instead of making fun of the micro-USB cable’s nib, embrace it! Come upon a coaxial cable? F’ it—it’s the cable company. If we stick together, we can be sure of this: there’ll be one cable they think they need, but they’ll have to take us all out at once to get to it. An hour later, they’ll have untangled us all and used the opportunity to get their drawer in order. Then they’ll inevitably realize that the cord or cable they thought would be what they needed is, in fact, not. So they’ll put everything back in the drawer nicely, and marvel at how organized it is — only to find it a jumbled mess the next time they open it because we’ll get horny all over again. It’s what the premise of hoarding is all about, ain’t it?!”
And so it goes: everything in the drawer gets busy. A clump is born.
Thus concludes today’s episode of the Digital Anthropomorphic Theater (DAT). Have a cable drawer of your own? Before you open it next time, put your ear to its exterior and see if you hear any chatter inside. It might just get you ready for what’s next.