I’ve been thinking about ‘undo’ keys this short week, and also my experience without power over a few days of Sandy. A good friend sent me this article that asks the question, “Can true solitude be found in a wired world?”
I was really struck by this quote:
“What might have felt like an obligation at first has become an addiction. It’s almost as if we don’t know how to be alone, or we are afraid of what we’ll find when we are alone with ourselves,” says Camille Preston, a tech and communication consultant based in Cambridge, Mass.
I wonder about how profound these changes are. People my age – thirtysomethings – are in the generation who remembers life before the internet, before social networks and digital connectedness. And yet, many of us have become every bit as dependent on the web as the youth I teach.
Last night, I got up from bed and padded to my kitchen four times. I was expecting an email (or text), and the only place I get service when cable/internet is down is right next to my kitchen window. As I tried to shut down my mind for the night, I kept thinking about this puzzle piece of information that was missing from my day – or was it?
Do words and actions and consequences have the same impact when we’re living life onscreen? Do we need to ‘undo’ these effects in order to assess what sort of impact we’re having on the “real” world?
