This Room Is Full Of Memories And, Shadows Of The Past Remind Me, Of All The Love I Gave In Vain And, All The Hurt I Feel Inside Me
--"I Want You Back", Bananarama
Back when I had a show, it was the only show I would watch the whole night. When Avonlea was on I didn't plan anything else for the whole night. Come 8 p.m. Monday I was glued to the television and there was nothing on Earth that could pry me away from it. Pretty much for the whole day that was the even everything else was leading up to.
Compare that to how I typically watch television on Mondays. Now in no certain order, thanks to the magic of DVR, I watch no less that seven shows on Mondays--House, Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, Heroes, 24, Chuck, and Gossip Girl. Granted, they're all good shows, but none of them are the centerpiece for the night, let alone the only thing I watch on that evening. 24, I suppose, comes the closest to being the gem among gems. Even that, though, I've caught myself checking my e-mail during the commercial breaks or even working on an idea for a post during the main action of the episode. I am nowhere near as consumed as I was when I watched Avonlea on a weekly basis. Somewhere between then and now I lost the taste for a particular show being my obsession. Now I see them all as what maybe they were all along, pieces of entertainment.
It's not just television. I remember a day off consisted of riding my bike down the block to my friend Tommy's house and just hanging out all day--no invitation, no chatting first on my cel, no e-mail. I would bicycle down and knock on his door. If he was home we did something. If not, I went home. Now to even schedule a dinner or even a drink after work, it involves a three-hour delayed negotiation over a combination of cel texting, facebook, and/or e-mailing my work. Even then there's hardly any opportunity for a large quality of time devoted to one thing. I catch myself twittering as often about a thing as doing the thing itself. Even worse, I find myself thinking of ideas for something else--a game, a post, even a story I'm writing--and sending the information to myself in a text on my cel phone. There's never an ocassion where I'm entirely centered on whatever I'm doing.
I guess that's a product of the age we live in. I guess with all this technology there's never a need to be entirely consumed with much anymore. The buzzword of the day is multi-tasking and spreading one's interests.
Deep down there's a huge part of me that thinks we're missing out compared to when we couldn't get to a phone or computer very easily. I'm still of the mind that thinks it's wrong to fast forward or rewind a DVD once it's started, let alone (Gasp!) pause it. I'm still of the mind that thinks it's wrong to mass e-mail people a letter. Some of my fondest memories involve carving out sixty and seventy page missives to Breanne and, of course, Jina. I'm still of the mind that hates when people decide on plans once they come together instead of making plans beforehand. I'm all for being impulsive, but lately it seems nobody wants to commit to hard and fast plans. Instead, they all prefer this play-by-ear, spur-of-the-moment lifestyle where nothing specific gets done but a little bit of everything does.
It feels like the world lost a lot of its depth the instant people began to be able to do most everything with the touch of a button. It feels like everyone in the world became more distant the second it become commonplace to talk to everyone at a moment's notice. It feels like the world's gotten colder since you can find people with the same interests so easily through the internet and forums rather than having to pick your confidantes from your neighbors and schoolmates. It just feels like everyone's always distracted no matter what they're doing at the time; at no point in history has it been so easy to be interrupted or pulled away from life.
It's times like these that make me long for places like nineteenth century PEI, where you literally had nowhere else to go, nothing else to do, and nothing else to think about except life in a small village.
And you were happy about that.
Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers
Back when I had a show, it was the only show I would watch the whole night. When Avonlea was on I didn't plan anything else for the whole night. Come 8 p.m. Monday I was glued to the television and there was nothing on Earth that could pry me away from it. Pretty much for the whole day that was the even everything else was leading up to.Compare that to how I typically watch television on Mondays. Now in no certain order, thanks to the magic of DVR, I watch no less that seven shows on Mondays--House, Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother, Heroes, 24, Chuck, and Gossip Girl. Granted, they're all good shows, but none of them are the centerpiece for the night, let alone the only thing I watch on that evening. 24, I suppose, comes the closest to being the gem among gems. Even that, though, I've caught myself checking my e-mail during the commercial breaks or even working on an idea for a post during the main action of the episode. I am nowhere near as consumed as I was when I watched Avonlea on a weekly basis. Somewhere between then and now I lost the taste for a particular show being my obsession. Now I see them all as what maybe they were all along, pieces of entertainment.
It's not just television. I remember a day off consisted of riding my bike down the block to my friend Tommy's house and just hanging out all day--no invitation, no chatting first on my cel, no e-mail. I would bicycle down and knock on his door. If he was home we did something. If not, I went home. Now to even schedule a dinner or even a drink after work, it involves a three-hour delayed negotiation over a combination of cel texting, facebook, and/or e-mailing my work. Even then there's hardly any opportunity for a large quality of time devoted to one thing. I catch myself twittering as often about a thing as doing the thing itself. Even worse, I find myself thinking of ideas for something else--a game, a post, even a story I'm writing--and sending the information to myself in a text on my cel phone. There's never an ocassion where I'm entirely centered on whatever I'm doing.
I guess that's a product of the age we live in. I guess with all this technology there's never a need to be entirely consumed with much anymore. The buzzword of the day is multi-tasking and spreading one's interests.
Deep down there's a huge part of me that thinks we're missing out compared to when we couldn't get to a phone or computer very easily. I'm still of the mind that thinks it's wrong to fast forward or rewind a DVD once it's started, let alone (Gasp!) pause it. I'm still of the mind that thinks it's wrong to mass e-mail people a letter. Some of my fondest memories involve carving out sixty and seventy page missives to Breanne and, of course, Jina. I'm still of the mind that hates when people decide on plans once they come together instead of making plans beforehand. I'm all for being impulsive, but lately it seems nobody wants to commit to hard and fast plans. Instead, they all prefer this play-by-ear, spur-of-the-moment lifestyle where nothing specific gets done but a little bit of everything does.
It feels like the world lost a lot of its depth the instant people began to be able to do most everything with the touch of a button. It feels like everyone in the world became more distant the second it become commonplace to talk to everyone at a moment's notice. It feels like the world's gotten colder since you can find people with the same interests so easily through the internet and forums rather than having to pick your confidantes from your neighbors and schoolmates. It just feels like everyone's always distracted no matter what they're doing at the time; at no point in history has it been so easy to be interrupted or pulled away from life.
It's times like these that make me long for places like nineteenth century PEI, where you literally had nowhere else to go, nothing else to do, and nothing else to think about except life in a small village.
And you were happy about that.
Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers
Labels: Avonlea, Bananarama, Devotion, focus, Nostalgia
posted by mojo shivers @ 12:57 AM
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