Changing technologies affect lifestyles
Remember typewriters? Funny what one remembers and what emotions those memories elicit.
When I took typing in school (yes, it was called typing, not keyboarding), we used IBM Selectric typewriters (there was a round ball that had the letters on it). Later, during college, I went to work at a newspaper in Monroe, La., where computers were used, and we typed on keyboards.
When I moved to Northwest Arkansas, the newspaper in Bentonville had manual typewriters. I’d never used a manual typewriter. It actually required finger strength!
At some point, the paper purchased and installed a computer with consoles for each reporter’s desk. The computer itself was huge and in its own air-conditioned room.
Now, we carry phones that have more capabilities than that huge computer had. The cameras on our cellphones are better than the first digital cameras we used.
Young people today can’t fathom such antiquities.
Forget “roll-up” vehicle windows and “dial” telephones!
One of my sons was taking one of my grandsons on an errand. The little Ford ranger pickup truck had manual windows and my grandson could not imagine what the handle on the door was for. He’d never seen “roll-up” vehicle windows.
Remember actually dialing telephones and waiting for the dial to complete the circle, especially when dialing an 8, 9 or 0? Then, came touch-tone phones and now, people just speak to their cellphones — “Call Mom.”
Our first television was a small box with dials on the front and antenna that we called “rabbit ears” that were adjusted often to try to catch a signal. And, the screens displayed black and white (and many shades of gray) pictures. In Shreveport, La., we had three channels and they broadcast from 6 a.m. until midnight. There was no middle of the night television programming.
TV shows ran weekly so one had to wait a week to catch the next installment of a regular program. Now, people binge-watch shows on several different formats.
I used to think my greatgrandmother lived through an era in which she experienced tremendous change. Born in 1885, she was accustomed to people still dependent on horses for transportation. By the time she passed, in 1973, trains, airplanes and rocket ships had become more normal than anyone in her early life could have imagined.
The changes in her era were huge and were very visible.
The changes in our era are huge, but visibly minuscule, yet culturally tremendous. The young people today are constantly bombarded with new technologies and have unceasing access to information, to change. That affects their attitudes, their mental processes.
Whether we like the changes is irrelevant. They’re here. We of the older generation must recognize the impact these technologies have on our youth and seek to communicate with them where they are instead of constantly comparing their lifestyles to our own, more familiar ways.
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