Truth Thursday
Today on my train ride to New York, I sat across the aisle from a man who had out his laptop, his iPad and his iPhone, and he was using all three at once. I wasn’t clear on what he was really doing (it actually sounded like he was on the phone with a tech expert, trying to fix some password on his iPad) but he clearly thought he was being incredibly productive with all his technology at his fingertips on the go.
I, on the other hand, read two paper newspapers cover to cover and the first essay in a (paperback) book of literary essays I’ve been meaning to get to for a while. It was a gorgeous piece, about scent, memory and longing.
I didn’t look at my agendas for my meetings, and I didn’t answer any emails (as I did have my phone with me.) I spent three and a half hours sitting and thinking, reading for pleasure, and preparing myself mentally for a long day of meetings, but without electronics.
It felt both a little slothful and absolutely delightful.
There is a part of me that salivates over having a new gadget. I want an iPad so that I don’t have to schlep my laptop when I travel overseas. I want a new iPhone since my 3GS is moving pretty slowly after almost two years. I love my iMac – it makes typing on my computer a pleasurable, tactile experience.
But I also fall on the other side of the technology trap. I have tried using an e-reader, but really prefer reading books – I like looking at their covers, feeling their pages, turning down a corner on something I want to remember. I like closing the book after reading the final page and the sense of satisfaction that comes with putting it on the shelf.
I don’t like reading newspapers online – I much prefer getting newsprint on my hands and using a real pen to do the crossword puzzle.
I thought about bringing my laptop to my set of meetings in order to more easily take notes, but in fact, I prefer taking notes with a pad and pen.
I am definitely a technology immigrant. I didn’t have access to a computer until my senior year of college. My senior thesis was writing on the CHUC system in the basement of our Humanities building – specialized computer systems for humanities students. The 5 ½ inch floppy disk that I carried around cavalierly in my backpack got crumpled and my roommate had to retype my entire 75-page paper to help me get it in on time.
When I started my first job in a boutique PR firm in 1984, one of our clients gave us our first fax machine. One of my jobs was to send and receive faxes from that client. The faxes were often 15-20 pages long. Each page had to be set into the teeth of the machine, and it took 15 minutes per page for the stylus to “read” the page and send it. Oftentimes, the page wouldn’t go through, and I would spend literally hours trying to get the pages to run.
Today, I can send scores of pages with the click of one button.
My kids, needless to say, are technology natives. Everything comes easily to them with computers, iPods, phones, and everything else. My daughter is currently trying to make the case that she needs a smart phone – at 13. Apparently, everyone else has one.
I worry about their spending too much time on all these devices. But on the other hand, this is their lives. As I was sitting on the train this morning, thinking about how I wasn’t plugged in for a few hours, I was conscious of how renegade that felt in this day and age. But it also felt good. I find that when I let my mind have a little space in which to wander, I come out on the other side with clearer thinking and good ideas. It’s refreshing to empty my mind a bit and allow for some free flowing creativity.
There are studies about how kids don’t have enough quiet time, without external stimulation, and that it hinders their creativity. There’s also plenty of evidence to suggest that kids benefit greatly from family time, including dinnertime when there are no phones, no texting and no screens at the table.
We try to set rules around computer use, no texting at meals, Wii time and other electronics in our house. But the fact is that electronics have become more than simply diversions – they are, in fact, extensions of ourselves. And even though I appreciated the several hours of quiet, unplugged time on Amtrak today, I am as guilty of not wanting to be too far from my computer when I’m home. Whether it’s to check work email, play word games with friends who live all over the country, dip into my daily Facebook cocktail conversation or look up some pertinent fact or another, technology is an integral piece of my life.
It’s all spinning so quickly, and there is no going back. I can’t even imagine what communications will look like in three months, let alone three years. But I am determined to continue to look for opportunities to sit with a newspaper, a book, and just my own thoughts, staring out the train window, clearing and quieting my mind – and allowing for the natural development of creativity in a modern, noisy, plugged-in world.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ivyfield/4486938191/sizes/m/in/photostream/
Photo by Yutaka Tsutano via Flickr
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