miraculous tech
When I was a kid we lived in a pretty untechnological world by today's standards. Oh don't get me wrong, we were on the cutting edge, modern, replete with gadgets, gizmos and marvels! There were little devices that sang to us and a box that showed moving pictures in full colour. We had machines that let us pull thousands of pounds with only a light small old woman as a driver! Anyone, even a child could move a mountain.
Well and so on, you know, we were only aware of how far we had come thence, not what was not yet invented, or how great our unsolved problems were, or the miracles that awaited us.
Today, however, I can look back and see the changes. Some are curses rather than miracles but that is always the way of it, isn't it? Take video. I grew up on TV so there's always been some recourse to distraction from stories. However, the TV often let us down in the early years. You'd tune in and find only test pattern screens, or programming that was the exact opposite of what you needed. This happened a lot, in fact, and even a TV junkie would be hard pressed to do more than three hours a day including news and late night movies! What's more, if there was something you really wanted to see, you had to plan your life around it. The VCR was a great relief when it arrived!
So if you're sick at home, or having a bad day, you need human company to take your mind off it. Yes, a person skilled in talking about happy things and with a good sense of humour, the patience of a saint and a willing pair of hands to backup the assurances with personal action.
Do you know anyone like that? Other than a mother to her child, that is. I was that person for people a lot of the time. I'd come over with soup and tea and something for amusement, either a deck of cards, or a book to read, or later in life, a video to watch, something. If you lived nearby enough I'd check in on you often enough to be sure you weren't suffering alone in there.
For me, this never happened. All my worst illness times I've been alone, isolated, and feeling abandoned. I get too sick to reach out and nobody ever seems to reach in. I don't know why. If I try to find out, I'm accused of being an attention whore. Like wanting as much attention as I've given to others is somehow asking too much. That makes me feel less important than everyone else but I can't react to that feeling either, because again I'm demanding attention I don't deserve, or something.
So today's miracle is the on demand video stream. We don't think of it as a video stream, we just pop onto the internet (these days that's just turning on the device we use) and select a video from one of a multitude of selections provided by businesses who throw ads in our face to pay for it. We can even subscribe to see ad-free material. You don't like it? Don't have to wait for it to finish to watch something else, just stop it and start a new choice. Can't continue to the end for some reason? Pause and resume later.
Want to keep watching but can't stay where you're at? finish it on a small screen in your pocket.
Oh you don't know how deeply I craved portable TVs as a kid. I used to daydream about a wrist watch TV and I remember drooling over those pocket sized LCD tvs that came out in the 80s. They had a little matchbox screen and were about the size of a flip phone opened up. They cost as much as today's smart phones, but in dollars that were five times harder to earn.
When the digital revolution finally reached the bargain store shelves in 1998 I bought my first hand held device, a franklin Ebook. Suddenly my favorite on-demand video service from my whole life had become convenient enough for everywhere. Books with stories translate directly to vision in my head. I see the scene and characters (never their faces, though?) and hear the dialog and audio. Not with every book, but that's one of the features I use to say a book is "good." Well enough described to fill the scene for me. With a paper book, you're limited to one novel, it's hard to fit in a small purse or pocket, and vulnerable to dirt, wind, moisture, and being jammed into a purse. With an ebook reader I could carry more books in my back pocket than I'd ever owned in my life. I could hold it in a single hand, turning pages with a thumb. I could size the text just right. I could cry on the pages without damage. I could spill my food, accidentally set it on a damp spot, read it in the tub (but always hanging over the outside rim), and yank it out to read any time, anywhere.
Kind of like a smart phone now does video and games. I used to always carry a deck of cards and a novel. If I couldn't get lost in a novel I could always play a game of solitaire. I even knew a couple of games I could play in my hands when I had no table to hand. I do that with my smartphone now too.
So every time I get upset, or am coping with my illness and the pain it offers, or just need to calm down, I can call up a video or a game and put my mind right off the current situation. Like how a friend could come by and talk about interesting things to put your mind off your troubles.
So I'm grateful for today's technology. I could manage without it but I certainly value it too highly to choose to.
Well and so on, you know, we were only aware of how far we had come thence, not what was not yet invented, or how great our unsolved problems were, or the miracles that awaited us.
Today, however, I can look back and see the changes. Some are curses rather than miracles but that is always the way of it, isn't it? Take video. I grew up on TV so there's always been some recourse to distraction from stories. However, the TV often let us down in the early years. You'd tune in and find only test pattern screens, or programming that was the exact opposite of what you needed. This happened a lot, in fact, and even a TV junkie would be hard pressed to do more than three hours a day including news and late night movies! What's more, if there was something you really wanted to see, you had to plan your life around it. The VCR was a great relief when it arrived!
So if you're sick at home, or having a bad day, you need human company to take your mind off it. Yes, a person skilled in talking about happy things and with a good sense of humour, the patience of a saint and a willing pair of hands to backup the assurances with personal action.
Do you know anyone like that? Other than a mother to her child, that is. I was that person for people a lot of the time. I'd come over with soup and tea and something for amusement, either a deck of cards, or a book to read, or later in life, a video to watch, something. If you lived nearby enough I'd check in on you often enough to be sure you weren't suffering alone in there.
For me, this never happened. All my worst illness times I've been alone, isolated, and feeling abandoned. I get too sick to reach out and nobody ever seems to reach in. I don't know why. If I try to find out, I'm accused of being an attention whore. Like wanting as much attention as I've given to others is somehow asking too much. That makes me feel less important than everyone else but I can't react to that feeling either, because again I'm demanding attention I don't deserve, or something.
So today's miracle is the on demand video stream. We don't think of it as a video stream, we just pop onto the internet (these days that's just turning on the device we use) and select a video from one of a multitude of selections provided by businesses who throw ads in our face to pay for it. We can even subscribe to see ad-free material. You don't like it? Don't have to wait for it to finish to watch something else, just stop it and start a new choice. Can't continue to the end for some reason? Pause and resume later.
Want to keep watching but can't stay where you're at? finish it on a small screen in your pocket.
Oh you don't know how deeply I craved portable TVs as a kid. I used to daydream about a wrist watch TV and I remember drooling over those pocket sized LCD tvs that came out in the 80s. They had a little matchbox screen and were about the size of a flip phone opened up. They cost as much as today's smart phones, but in dollars that were five times harder to earn.
When the digital revolution finally reached the bargain store shelves in 1998 I bought my first hand held device, a franklin Ebook. Suddenly my favorite on-demand video service from my whole life had become convenient enough for everywhere. Books with stories translate directly to vision in my head. I see the scene and characters (never their faces, though?) and hear the dialog and audio. Not with every book, but that's one of the features I use to say a book is "good." Well enough described to fill the scene for me. With a paper book, you're limited to one novel, it's hard to fit in a small purse or pocket, and vulnerable to dirt, wind, moisture, and being jammed into a purse. With an ebook reader I could carry more books in my back pocket than I'd ever owned in my life. I could hold it in a single hand, turning pages with a thumb. I could size the text just right. I could cry on the pages without damage. I could spill my food, accidentally set it on a damp spot, read it in the tub (but always hanging over the outside rim), and yank it out to read any time, anywhere.
Kind of like a smart phone now does video and games. I used to always carry a deck of cards and a novel. If I couldn't get lost in a novel I could always play a game of solitaire. I even knew a couple of games I could play in my hands when I had no table to hand. I do that with my smartphone now too.
So every time I get upset, or am coping with my illness and the pain it offers, or just need to calm down, I can call up a video or a game and put my mind right off the current situation. Like how a friend could come by and talk about interesting things to put your mind off your troubles.
So I'm grateful for today's technology. I could manage without it but I certainly value it too highly to choose to.