Disconnected

But Siriously, what did we do before the advent of the smart phone? Well, we had to write with a pen (not stylus, you techies!) on paper, for one. Remember those address book/diary/planner thingies....wonder what happened to all that cheap plastic/leather and paper? Oh, I'm pretty sure they are still in your home.....flew back from China after being morphed into another useless possession. We used those to keep track of important things in our life. We would take notes on a notepad and stop at a gas station or convenience store for directions. We would wait to get home so we can connect with family and friends over the land line. Now we just bark at our phones. A while ago, when the first Bluetooth earpieces were the in-thing, my MIL and I were out on a walk. She saw this man pacing around in circles, having an animated conversation with what appeared to be himself and with a very sad face said..."Paavam, avannukku yenna prachanaiyo, let me pray for him!" Wonder how she will react now to people yelling in helpless rage at their phone while the phone replies in gibberish.


This talking personal assistant is a bit worrisome though.....my offspring talk for hours to the phone and the phone replies patiently, albeit with attitude. Just to put this in perspective, when I ask how school was, they reply in monosyllables. The line thins between the human and the robotic and the robots are winning, at least in my home. We have more gadgets in our home than we do windows.......a bit disturbing if you ask me. Hand-helds are changing the way that we socialize, even becoming our security blankets in an uncomfortable situation. Awkward pauses in conversation are a thing of the past....people just whip up their phones and disappear into a personal virtual world and come back, for want of a better word, re-charged. In everybody's defense though, it is easy to get lulled into believing that the phone is a real person, because even I find myself talking to the phone a lot these days. However, the other day I asked if it would like to talk about feelings and got the following reply..."I'm not sure I understand....would you like me to run a web search for that?" And then, I remembered that many men were possibly behind programming the smart phones. Droid! I didn't just say that, but come to think of it, somethings are still comfortingly familiar!


Addendum: I found this hilarious and pertinent to the post...Enjoy!

Couch on the curb

Autumn Movement by Carl Sandburg

I cried over beautiful things knowing no beautiful thing lasts.

The field of cornflower yellow is a scarf at the neck of the copper sunburned woman, the mother of the year, the taker of seeds.

The northwest wind comes and the yellow is torn full of holes, new beautiful things come in the first spit of snow on the northwest wind, and the old things go, not one lasts.

Thoughts on autumn are rather morose, always with a sense of doom at the upcoming winter. The carefree days of summer have come to an end and apart from the brief, breathtaking splendor of fall colors, bleak days of winter await. The days are alternatively beautiful and warm or cool and blustery. One never knows what to wear or how the day will unfold. It is a time of chaos, confusion and sleep pattern changes with the end of daylight savings time. Jackets are sent to be dry cleaned, flu shots are taken, summer clothes put away and nuts stored for the winter. Amidst all this, there is an urgent need to de-clutter, going through closets, shoe racks, garages and sheds.......letting go of things not needed to make room for other essentials. This happens twice an year, in spring and in fall, and no sight is more representative than the couch on the curb.

There it sits majestically, patiently awaiting its fate in the hands of the clean-up truck.  It's an ugly old thing, often wearing coffee and wine stains or results of an ironing mishap (or two). It sports runaway springs which have lost the battle against incessant trampoliners and sag-lines which indicate seating preferences of the family that owned it. It is sometimes a relic from the distant past, which reminds us wistfully of days bygone and styles we fondly refer to as being retro. It weaves a story like no other....of TV dinners, first stolen kisses, gazing contently at a newborn sleeping peacefully in arms, life altering announcements, lonely dates with a tub of ice cream, riotous gatherings, conversations, sport rivalries, huddling in a blanket and watching a horror movie and quiet cuddle times. It encompasses the emotional roller-coaster of a life well lived. Yet, here it waits, abruptly cast away from being the silent spectator of that very life. The decision to do away always comes with some measure of sadness even as the delivery truck is awaited with excitement....the harbinger of new, furniture and memories alike. Bittersweet is the word that comes to mind.

Change in seasons and in life can similarly be bittersweet. Even as greenery turns to desolate nothingness, it provides us with a sensational swan song of wondrous pigmentation. For most of nature, winter is a time of rest until rays of sunshine hug closer to the earth and life cycles are renewed in spring. In the human world, life still goes on in earnest. We are layered, cold and sun-deprived. Yet life goes on at a frenetic pace, seldom slowing down and never stopping. If the world will not pause around us, can we instead pause within for a self-check? If we are ensconced in our own small universes of personal highs and lows, how can we open our consciousness to new and extraordinary experiences? How can we enrich our lives and take it from mundane to miraculous? We do get so comfortable in our own personal spaces, beliefs and routines, often unbending to the new and unfamiliar. Maybe its time to pause, reflect and put the old familiar couch on the curb. As with everything else in life, magical experiences and subsequent memories await.