YOU REALLY DON’T HAVE TO HAVE EMAIL

WHEN everyone started getting email addresses I remember thinking, mmm, what’s that all about? I didn’t see why I needed to communicate by email as I have never really been into computers. I’m a bit of a technophobe, so I didn’t bother. I do have a mobile phone, but it’s an old Nokia with no internet.

I was just as nonplussed when Facebook and Twitter came along. As I am on air every day for Radio 2 and Radio London, and write a column, I didn’t want the added pressure of having to tell people what I had just had for breakfast. I also didn’t want to have to be witty all the time. The contact emails and Twitter feed for my shows are managed by my production team, not me.

Little did I guess that in a couple of years social media would be world-dominating and people would be staring at their phones all the time.

Over the years I have managed very well not being connected. Whenever I see someone glued to their phone, I ask what is it they are transfixed by. Inevitably, it is something incredibly dull.

I do my research via my home-assembled reference library, so I don’t have to Google anything. If I have to book tickets, I do it by phone.

I prefer to have acres of quiet time to read, think uninterrupted thoughts, grow vegetables in the garden, or go and see real people, rather than talk to ones I’ve never met on social media.

I am lucky my children live close by, so I can see them every day. Of course, if they moved to the other side of the world, and I needed to Skype them, I might take a different view. Needs must. And if it ever gets to the point where I need it at work, I’ll do it. Like everything, it’s a choice.

Vanessa presents the Breakfast programme on BBC Radio London every weekday from 7am to 10am.