Severed
I'm just getting ready to leave. Things on my mind? My distaste for sharing a room with someone and my distress at losing constant internet access for five weeks. The loving glow of the computer screen. Mmmm, glow. Shhh, there there, crazy lady, it will be alright. Everything's going to be aright.
It's bizarre and a little bit frightening (in a socio-cultural deterioration sense, not a boogeyman-spiders-things-that-go-bump-in-the-night sense). My brother in Europe is sending emails from the floor of a train via his companion's blackberry. Hang on a tic... now of course that's not common right now, not everyone has a handy little device that will do that. But its only a matter of time before we are connected constantly to the world around us as we walk. Last night I went for a two hour walk to the beach and along the water. I didn't bring my purse or phone, and even after having it for two weeks I felt somehow detached. What if someone needed to reach me? This is strange and not the least bit unsettling. Since when do I need to be reached?
My sense of technological necessity is growing, and I feel that without my internet connection I am lost. People understand, they empathize, they tell me how lost they would feel. But doesn't it make them uncomfortable to find themselves so dependent? Its an acute sense, I feel it actively. Without the internet at my fingertips I am aware that it is gone. It is not appropriate to be this connected to a human being. If I were dating the internet and couldn't bear to be separated from it for a month I would be seen as hopelessly codependent and pathetic. So why am I not pathetic for feeling this way about my computer? My music? My blog and instant messenger? Soon it will be the mobile phone, already I am thinking about how I will be giving it up in a month. Somehow, despite holding out on all this technology for so long, I am just as integrated as everyone else. Its scary.
The officially this is a temporary signoff. I will be updating as I can from the machines around campus, and doing what I can to keep up with people over email. After eight months of almost daily posting, I must say it will be strange not to write here. Expect updates to be long!
It's bizarre and a little bit frightening (in a socio-cultural deterioration sense, not a boogeyman-spiders-things-that-go-bump-in-the-night sense). My brother in Europe is sending emails from the floor of a train via his companion's blackberry. Hang on a tic... now of course that's not common right now, not everyone has a handy little device that will do that. But its only a matter of time before we are connected constantly to the world around us as we walk. Last night I went for a two hour walk to the beach and along the water. I didn't bring my purse or phone, and even after having it for two weeks I felt somehow detached. What if someone needed to reach me? This is strange and not the least bit unsettling. Since when do I need to be reached?
My sense of technological necessity is growing, and I feel that without my internet connection I am lost. People understand, they empathize, they tell me how lost they would feel. But doesn't it make them uncomfortable to find themselves so dependent? Its an acute sense, I feel it actively. Without the internet at my fingertips I am aware that it is gone. It is not appropriate to be this connected to a human being. If I were dating the internet and couldn't bear to be separated from it for a month I would be seen as hopelessly codependent and pathetic. So why am I not pathetic for feeling this way about my computer? My music? My blog and instant messenger? Soon it will be the mobile phone, already I am thinking about how I will be giving it up in a month. Somehow, despite holding out on all this technology for so long, I am just as integrated as everyone else. Its scary.
The officially this is a temporary signoff. I will be updating as I can from the machines around campus, and doing what I can to keep up with people over email. After eight months of almost daily posting, I must say it will be strange not to write here. Expect updates to be long!
posted by Care @ 6:43 p.m.
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