As a small boy growing up in a small town my world, seemed to be defined by what I heard from those around me. We had no newspaper or television. We had one phone in the house and mom and dad used it exclusively and sparingly. To call the next town 7 miles away was long distance. To say I wasn’t interested in what went on in the world was true to some extent. My world consisted of my friends, family and this beautiful world around me.
Every once in awhile you hear about older people who won’t get in the game when it comes to all of the new electronic devices. To many of them they are confusing, expensive and just something else to worry about. As for me I have tried to play the game but must admit I only know the basics and when trouble comes I’m in trouble. The other day I lost my Internet signal and for all practical purposes I was dead in the water. I called my provider and he told me that my problem was my antiquated equipment and I just needed a new router, which he installed. The signal came back but almost immediately left again. Before I called him back to complain I called my son-in-law and explained the problem and he told me something else to try and bingo, things are working again. Sometimes it just takes a village. A younger village.
I go to the doctor the other day and there are probably five of us sitting in the waiting room. I’m staring at the television and the others are all on their phones. The nurse came and called one of them and they replied, “just a minute” and they had to finish typing out their message on their phone while the nurse waited patiently. She was still texting as she walked down the hall. Every public meeting whether it’s church or a P.T.A meeting is preceded by the announcement, “Please turn off or silence your phones.” I have seen people during these events, typing on their muted phone. I can only presume someone needed their help terribly. I have stood at the check out lane in the grocery while someone empties their cart and checks out, all the time talking on their phone, which they then turn around and use to pay the bill electronically. Not criticizing, just stating its what it’s all coming too.
When I leave for the winter I used to put my Internet on a vacation hold, until my children and grandchildren, who come in the winter for a weekend at the lake, told me they weren’t coming anymore if there was no Internet. So to save my plants they cared for, and not be an ogre, I turned it back on. I have watched kids texting when they are sitting right next to each other. I have family and friends who never call, they only text. They have abbreviations for most of the words so it takes some imagination to decipher them. We have long ago forgotten how to write cursive and next we will forget how to speak.
At some point in our never ending conflicts with the rest of the world, someone is going to figure out that to render us unable to communicate with each other—is the way to defeat us. So we won’t be able to defend our country and let people know what is going on, they only need to fire one shot and take out a satellite and we will be dead in the water with our phones in our hands. No pun intended.
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