LET US TAKE TIME FOR NEW VISTAS. January 9, This year Chapter BA here in Houston, Texas, has as its general theme for

Transcription

1 C-43 LET US TAKE TIME FOR NEW VISTAS January 9, 1970 by This year Chapter BA here in Houston, Texas, has as its general theme for programs "Let Us Take Time." I was asked to present a program on "Let Us Take Time for New Vistas," and when I began working on my. assigned subject, I suddenly realized that source material could really not be found in a library or elsewhere,. 'This would have to be a program of ideas, and they would have to be my own ideas, based on my own thinking. And so perhaps I should say at this point that "the ideas you are about to hear belong solely to Ruth Arrington and are not necessarily those of the management." As I began to consider this subject "Let Us Take Time for New Vistas," my first thoughts were concerned with the concept of Time, and so I would like to begin by discussing this subject just a bit. Helen Hurt began our series of programs in October by reading a poem which is in our current yearbook. This poem begins with this line: "Time to wisely use the greatest gift of all - the gift of time." How precious time is: This is something we have all learned through the years, and each year to me it seems more and more precious. We all know that we live in a changing world. Have you ever stopped to think of the rapid and radical changes we have seen in the last ten years? Consider, for example, the changes we have seen in music, art, even in fashion, and then consider the drastic changes during this time that have taken place in communication and transportation. Yes, we live in a rapidly changing world, a world of variables, but there is one big constant involved, and that constant is Time. We always have had, and always will have, a

2 24-hour day, and I'm quite sure we will always have a 7-day week. In this matter of time we are all equally endowed. Each person has 24 hours per day to USE or to SPENT to his best advantage.. It makes sense, then, since Time is limited, that Time is precious and should be treated as a valuable possession. Through the years we all hope our financial income will increase, and we look forward to having more money and thus being in a position to enjoy more of the goof things of life. But we can never look forward to having a longer day. Recently I had occasion to speak to a group of college girls and their parents, and in discussing this Time concept with them I suggested that for the college student a carefully planned time budget is just as essential as a carefuly planned financial budget. I am not going to suggest to you all here today that you set down in black and white a budget of your time and then try to follow it rigidly. This is something that you P.E.O.'s have already dealt with in your own way. The fact that you all are a group of successful women proves that you have used your time wisely through the years. I am going to say, however, that I feel that each one of us needs to exercise care in choosing where and how to use her time and also needs to guard constantly against wasting time, for the waste of time is truly tragic. Let me hasten to say that I certainly am in favor of leisure time and enjoying life, for we derive great benefit and pleasure from this, especially if it follows a period of productive work. For me, wasted time is time spent without any benefit to myself. That is what I want to guard against. Now that I have sounded off on how I feel about Time, let's consider the phrase "New Vistas" for a few minutes. If we consider the literal meaning of the phrase, we immediately think of new sights, new panoramas, new places and people, and this all suggests Travel. We human beings have many characteristics in common, and one

3 of these seems to be the desire to see new places and things. Certainly Travel is a most pleasant form of education, and I think we should all make the most of our travel opportunities. In May Letha Barber is going to present a program entitled "Let Us Take Time to Travel,' and so we will leave a discussion of this subject entirely up to her, and we will go on to some more abstract kinds of new vistas. Let's consider for a moment Our World Around Us or Our. Environment. We have already mentioned that the world is in a constant state of change. This is true of the geography of our continents among other things. Even the youngest of us here today has seen the various maps of the world undergo drastic changes. Countries disappear and others rise up in their places. Europe, Africa, and Asia have all seen great change. Who remembers the three little countries - Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, that used to be in the northeast part of Europe? These little countries lived briefly, I believe, between World War I and World War II. Today the map of Africa contains many new names such as Guinea and Ghana and Gabon, and just recently we saw the rise and then the fall of Biafra. Certainly what is happening to the map of Asia is of great concern to all of us. Even here in the U.S.A. we have all seen two new stars come into our flag. All these changes are truly new vistas for the people of the world, and it is essential that we make an effort to keep up with this changing scene. All of us here in Houston are especially familiar with our country's space program and the almost unbelievable progress in space travel that we saw in the decade o-f the 60's. Truly new vistas of great magnitude are unfolding for us in this area. Exploration of the moon is already under way, and plans are being made for future landings on Mars. At the same time we `are hearing more and more about Oceanography

4 and all that it implies. Oceanography is the study, exploration, and exploitation of the ocean depths, which we might think of as "inner space." It offers man another frontier, and he is accepting the challenge. Studies of the ocean floor have disclosed huge submarine mountain ranges and deep trenches that form a terrain more rugged than we know here on our land masses. The deep sea itself seems to be a complex system with currents flowing along in set paths like huge submarine rivers.. The varying temperatures that we have found indicate that the deep sea is probably subject to violent storms - just as is our atmosphere of air which surrounds. us. We are looking to the sea more and more as a source of food and minerals and possibly even for man's habitation at some future time. Exploration of space, both outer and inner, requires a highly advanced technology, and our age is certainly one of a very sophisticated technology. We see this e'denced in an infinite number of things that are continuously coming from the vi laboratories of the world. Technology is moving ahead with ever-increasing velocity and is constantly introducing us to new vistas. Consider the laser beam, for instance, which made its appearance around 1961 and was named laser, which really means light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation - and simply means an electronic device that amplifies light. The laser beam - which is called coherent light - may build up and focus power to exceed a billion watts per square centimeter: This phenomenon was not just a curiosity for very long, and today its many uses vary from welding and surveying to communication and holography. When the Polaroid camera was introduced to us some 15 or so years ago we were all astonished and.delighted with the nice picture that came out of the black box so quickly. More recently we have been even more delighted with the lovely colored pictures that the

5 Polaroid camera now produces. It all really seems quite fantastic. But let me tell you about holography. With the use of the coherent light of the laser it is now possible to produce a three-dimensional image, so that the subject can be seen in its entirety from any vantage point: The electron microscope, transistors, integrated circuits, and countless other new developments make possible many things that used to belong only to science fiction. The computer itself has become one of man's essential tools and is in use in every field of endeavor. We obviously cannot understand and know about all the things that are pouring out of our laboratories, but they constitute new vistas for all of mankind, and we should make an effort to know of their existence and add their names. to our vocabularies. Most of our newspapers and magazines - even the women's magazines - have reports for the layman. on these new developments in technology - so all we need to do is take time to read these things instead of skipping over them because they seem to be about something we never heard of. There is one other area which I feel should be considered along with New Vistas new thinking and new philosophies. Our world today is constantly offering us a wide variety of choices of things to do, causes to support, interests to pursue, and ideas to embrace. We are surrounded by such a barrage of advertising and subjected to so much propaganda that it is sometimes hard to think for ourselves. In fact, I agree with Vice President Agnew that we have instant analysis of events by news media until we are really discouraged from doing our own thinking and are apt to follow along with an analyst's interpretation. This is especially bad when so much of what we hear is a one-sided, biased opinion. I think today we are surrounded by more radical thinking than any other time has seen. Some of it is good - much seems to

6 be bad - and we need to analyze these things for ourselves and make our own choices. Many new ideas are coming forth in an effort to deal with major world problems such as pollution and hunger. These problems are outgrowths of the one big basic problem which we face today and will face even more tomorrow - the problem of over-population and it is certainly going to take some radical thinking to combat that. It seems to me that ultimately our population will have to be maintained at a point below the critical level - whatever that turns out to be-- and how can this be done?? Perhaps in addition to limiting the size of the family, the people of the future will ultimately have to qualify in some way before being allowed to become parents. We truly live in a time of New Vistas of all kinds and in all phases of our life. If we are to be good citizens and contributing members of our society, we must spend part of our precious time in keeping up with our world, in keeping tuned in to what is going on, and in choosing wisely those ideas and philosophies that we want to support. 'Ruth Arrington