Original Content: Connectedness

As I look round and of myself look down to the glow of the colors coming up from this phone, I write of things much said.

Remember your world before smartphones. This was a time with more eye contact. A time with longer attention spans. Decades ago we had to read The Hobbit.

Now, if you agree even a bit with this, then take another step back in time. Remember when your cell phone was just a phone it was a tool much like the phone on your wall. You increased your tethers to your personal community.

And now the student loan reps could reach you all the time. Each of us lost "I wasn't at home as an excuse". Though some will jump and say answering machines and voicemail took that away. In our lives, many of us may say those messages always fell to the black hole of inattention and unwritten messages.

Now those of us who can. Remember the lone, black, rotary phone on the wall. Ringing alone in the house on Maple Street. Unloved when we were gone. And ignored when we were home. Can we, you and I, reclaim those days?

There is value in time for thought. I move too fast, decide to rashly, avoid circumspection.

Real connections take time. Now we convince ourselves we are connected. Because we respond continually, send out words instantly, and forever answer something.

Don't get me wrong, I am part of the game and the problem. I just turn off my phone and my computer a lot.