Last week I sat in the lobby of an hotel ( before you say anything you do say an hotel and not a hotel). There was a couple in their late thirties. It was evening. They had just come from dinner, she dressed in her smart if not somewhat smaltzy dress, he in the customary shirt and slacks. Slacks - something my dad wore but there you go. Anyhow they were sitting quietly, and it would have been the perfect romantically inclined evening were it not for the laptop in front of them. Beside the laptop, their ipaddy,poddy thing.... For the next hour I watched as they surfed the net, caught up on facebook and intermittently checked the odd text ( texting...so, 2007.) The point is they didnt speak two words to each other. I looked around the lobby of the hotel had supplied a desktop for guests and yet another young couple were focussed on the screen. Again on social media. They were spending more time catching up with "friends" while not speaking to each other.
While in a restaraunt last week a young couple ( Christ am I that old?) came in and while waiting on their meal to arrive, spent the next ten minutes on their smartphones. Not speaking a word to eachother. The thing is, we have become more obsessed with "missing out" and who might be on-line than the actual people who matter.... the people sitting beside us! Real people with arms and legs. Leaving the house now without your phone is like leaving the house before without your rings.
Even our children growing up are using media devices, to connect with their many friends on facebook, twitter etc. I received a Fathers day book this year and one of ther verses read "Dont expect your child to do as you did...they are growing up in a different time."
That's all well and good, but when your entire family finds something like facebook more interesting than reality where are we heading? Even now, you are reading this drivel instead of talking to your nearest and dearest with a cup of tea in hand. So go on turn off whatever you have in your hand and go and talk to someone. I mean someone real. Someone who can feel and cry and laugh. As my good wife says, you have 427 friends on facebook. Why are you sitting on your own in front of a laptop?
So grasp the moment...say "my name is .....and I have been off social media for seven minutes." You might even find that person you live with is actually nice
Before you do, can you like this on facebook, Twitter.....
While in a restaraunt last week a young couple ( Christ am I that old?) came in and while waiting on their meal to arrive, spent the next ten minutes on their smartphones. Not speaking a word to eachother. The thing is, we have become more obsessed with "missing out" and who might be on-line than the actual people who matter.... the people sitting beside us! Real people with arms and legs. Leaving the house now without your phone is like leaving the house before without your rings.
Even our children growing up are using media devices, to connect with their many friends on facebook, twitter etc. I received a Fathers day book this year and one of ther verses read "Dont expect your child to do as you did...they are growing up in a different time."
That's all well and good, but when your entire family finds something like facebook more interesting than reality where are we heading? Even now, you are reading this drivel instead of talking to your nearest and dearest with a cup of tea in hand. So go on turn off whatever you have in your hand and go and talk to someone. I mean someone real. Someone who can feel and cry and laugh. As my good wife says, you have 427 friends on facebook. Why are you sitting on your own in front of a laptop?
So grasp the moment...say "my name is .....and I have been off social media for seven minutes." You might even find that person you live with is actually nice
Before you do, can you like this on facebook, Twitter.....