People who have read many of my blog entries will know that I usually
write about introspective feelings, thoughts and emotions, but today I would
like to write about something altogether different. I am going to talk about messaging
today as I think it is a relatively new phenomena in a world which has known
human civilisation for a couple of million years and until quite recently
relied solely on voices and body language to engage in the ancient art of
communication.
Before the introduction of the humble telephone in the 1870s people
could only communicate when standing directly in front or in shouting distance
of another person and I imagine that this was a far simpler time for everyone
involved. Once upon a century or so ago when a person took a walk to the local
shops for a pint of milk they simply wandered out of the door, towards the shop
and then once their transaction was complete they came home again. Things have
changed. Nowadays when a person wants to purchase a pint of milk they tell
Facebook about what they're going to do before they do it and no doubt
photograph the milk whilst it is still in the fridge so that everyone can be
aware of the milk that they are buying. It is important for those on our
friends list to know that we are getting enough calcium. This photographing of
the milk which I'm sure you are already aware is just a metaphor for all things
social networking related and is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to
the cataclysmic set of problems that technology has seen fit to afford us in
the modern day.
… Enter.. the smart phone. I have
a smart phone and I'm very fond of my smart phone but I think that for all of
the ease of communication that my smart phone affords me, I would probably be
better off without it. I remember those halcyon days when phones didn’t have
colour screens and a camera was something new and exotic; things were
definitely simpler in those days. I didn't have a smart phone and all I used my
phone for was to exchange simple messages and phone calls about functional
matters and then everything changed. My phone developed and went from being regular
to smart and then to highly intelligent. My phone has a mind of its own now and
it makes me doubt myself, it's always there flashing on and off, telling me
who's read my messages and is now ignoring me. Or perhaps this reader is just busy
and has every intention of replying at a more convenient time? But why not now
I ask myself? Am I not important enough? Does my message not carry enough significance
to make you abandon everything you're doing so that you can engage in a conversation
with me about the state of the leggings on the person I just walked past? Whatsapp used to be great for avoiding this pattern of self doubt. Whatsapp
didn't have a 'read' function and I liked it this way. Whatsapp has a 'read'
function now (strange that this happened once Facebook took over it hey?) which
means that in the shake of two little blue ticks you can go from feeling
comfortable and secure to weird and irritable. Everyone's been there and no one
likes it so why do we do it to ourselves? Why don't we insist that we would prefer
it if those we are communicating with just got back to us in their own time without
the pressure of little blue ticks, 'read' receipts, last seens, 'online nows'
and the plethora of other methods we use to trick ourselves into feeling insecure.
I am aware that I am saying 'I' and 'me' a lot. I'm not speaking about me
particularly but more patterns and events I have witnessed over the last couple
of years as communication becomes more and more widespread and life as we know it begins to change. I remember once when
I was waiting to hear back about a job and I was frustrated because I was well
aware that the giver of the job could easily send an email about it from their
mobile phone. Why can't they just tell me? I wondered. Well the answer is simple,
it just wasn't appropriate at that time. I got the job and all was fine but
those few days waiting were a nightmare. The instancy of modern life began to
be somewhat difficult in those few days. Everywhere we turn these days there's a new phone mast or an internet
connection appearing somewhere bizarre so that we can check our emails halfway
up a tree or post a selfie from the middle of the ocean. I would like to go
back to a time when telephone calls were functional and read receipts and
little blue ticks were still light years away. I don't like them, I don’t need
them and to be quite honest I'd like it if Mr Technology could take it all away
and leave me with the simpler life I had before. So then ladies and gents, should
I ditch the genius phone when this contract runs out? Perhaps I should go and
live in a tent, grow vegetables in an allotment and drink my water fresh from the
river. I could have an entirely more natural and self sustainable life than the
one I live now which appears to run on electronic communication. I could live in
nature and send smoke siganls when I really need to talk to someone and you can
bet I'd never feel even the slightest need to take a photograph of myself falling
alseep and show it to the world.
In conclusion… I don't think I'm really going to go and live in the middle
of nowhere, ditch my smart phone and teach myself how to build a fire from scratch
but I would like more information from whoever created all of this technology on
how best to use it and more importantly when to use it. Should it be functional
or should it be leisurely? Should I have my phone with me all of the time or should
I feel okay about leaving it at home? I guess the whole point of this little rant
of mine has been to simply say that I don't know why on God's green earth a person
needs to know everything about everything. Where has the mystery gone? Where is
the intrigue? Why does New Zealand
feel like it's next door to Spain
when it is actually just over a day away? Take me back to a time when the world
was mysterious, unknown and less electronic… says I, Helen who is posting this onto
the interweb. Hypocritical no?
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