I give up. I just can’t understand it.
A couple of days ago, after having dinner with friends and then attending a social event, one of the friends TEXTED me the next morning and thanked me for recommending the restaurant.
As I fumbled to TEXT a reply on my cellphone keyboard, another TEXT arrived from the same friend, asking if I had enjoyed the social gathering?
I sent off my answer to the first TEXT.
I still hadn’t finished TEXTING my response to the second query, when a third TEXT interrupted, asking how late I had stayed?
I did not answer.
In this modern world of super technology, when urban life moves at hyper speed and the entire history of world knowledge can fit into a disc you hold in the palm of your hand, surely someone should be able to invent a machine where .. . instead of typing our conversations back and forth one sentence at a time … we could actually just TALK to each other and communicate instantly!
So in one minute we could convey five times the information …complete with tonal inflections, audible chuckles and even hear each other’s voices simultaneously … in lieu of that cold, slower characterless and often misspelled TEXTED conversation conveys.
Whoever comes up with such a TALKING machine could become very rich!
And earn my life-long respect, appreciation and gratitude.
How did we get to this point in our MODERN civilization … where we now realistically talk about establishing a permanent populated base on Mars, where we actually have rockets that land back on their feet after blasting their cargo into space, where nano-technology is enabling medical miracles and other accomplishments once thought impossible … and yet, more and more of us are reverting to typed telegrams to convey messages or questions or even full discussions between one another?
Is carpel thumb-al soon to become our new debilitating medical crisis for the Millenial generation?
Are we all soon going to have to learn, or re-learn, Morse Code … in case we’re in a REAL hurry to convey something?
Now, I DO get it … that, in certain circumstances (not wanting to disturb those around us or just wanting to send a brief note to be read when the intended recipient can get to it) … TEXTING can serve a purpose.
But let’s keep it real!
Today, so many people are conducting so many FULL LENGTH conversations …. of little or absolutely no urgency at all … by typing them out that their faces for hours each day are directed downward at a 45 degree angle.
They move about oblivious to the world around them … TEXTING while walking (even while crossing busy roads); while eating (ignoring or insulting others at the table … unless they’re TEXTING too); while sitting on trains or on buses … even cruise ships!! … instead of observing, absorbing and enjoying the world around them; and, yes, even TEXTING while driving.
Why?
What has happened to us?
Maybe someone can explain it to me.
But please … don’t TEXT me your response.
Harv Oberfeld