staying connected

aside from my extremely long day at work yesterday, i suppose it was just like any other saturday. the weather was nice, people don't tip (more on that later, i promise), you know, the usual . . . except my phone died.

now this really isn't a big deal, you all know me for tending to let my phone go for awhile without a charge and perhaps i won't call you back for fear of putting the final proverbial nail in my phones dwindling power supply, but you'll at least get a text out of me. not yesterday. my inattention left me without my phone for just over 36 hours, and not only had it been awhile since i'd been without instantaneous communications, but it was also the first time since i'd had an active twitter account.

it wasn't the 13 missed text messages or the 4 voicemails or even the 45 minutes i spent last night catching up on it all, but for someone who is constantly being fed (seemingly useless) information, i found myself hungry to know the dumbest little details of my friend's lives (i'm sure it didn't help i was at work and had little else to occupy my thoughts). this got me thinking...

my first thought was something to the effect of "oh my god it's come to this point, i'm that cliche that micromanaging stage parents are always on fox news blabbering about. "the interwebs today have kids addicted to technology, that's why i homeschool my kids in a compound 90 miles from the nearest town with no electricity." now of course i mean no ill regards to homeschoolers, people who live in the boonies, or people with no electricity . . . but put them all together and there's something kinda eerie about it don't you think? anyway, i digress. for a few hours (in between delivering people their extra sides of ranch, drawn butter, and their fourteenth diet coke) i was trying to convince myself that i wasn't really addicted to technology, that it was a convenience that i sometimes took for granted, but that i didn't NEED it as an integral part of my personality. i may spend hours a day checking blogs, downloading torrents, playing on xbox live, texting, video chatting, researching, but i'm certainly not addicted. i also like camping with no internet, a nice roaring fire with marshmallows and the occasional phone ca . . . . shit.

so i am addicted, and the first step to an addiction is admitting you have a problem, right? wrong. the first step to an addiction is admitting you have an addiction, see the difference in wording there? some people will say that in this (dare i use the cliche phrase?) day and age (yep, why not, i'm tired) we're addicted to technology, and for some reason that is automatically bad, wrong, uncouth, morally unacceptable, unbecoming of an officer, adulterous, or worthy of a good whoopin' . . . whatever your choice phrase may be.

now this is nothing new or groundbreaking, i just wanted to throw my money into the fountain on this one. an "addiction", especially one to technology, is nothing to write home about, or to write anywhere about frankly, especially your local conservative news show. this instant link to the rest of the world may keep 23 i mean 13 year old boys in their basement and away from the sun for the majority of the vitamin-d boosting months of the year, but a skin tone that resembles a clean sheet of wax paper isn't worth the attack on an industry that has, is, and will forever change just about everything. a wholehearted embrace is what's needed for the nerds, geeks, and all around smart people that spend hours curled over a soldering station or staring into their gargantuan lcd screens because the possibilities are literally endless.

it is now that i realize i'm rambling because i can no longer remember when or how i began this little soap box parade of mine, but i think the point is to get out there and get connected, stay connected and figure out new ways to keep connecting to people. your digital footprints might not have a geographic location or a tangible book that can be admired in your study someday, but connections are about the spread of information. the faster the spread, the more we can all benefit by change.