Of BoobPads and BoobPhones

I remember that at some point in my early childhood that dressing me up in a cowgirl outfit and putting me in front of the TV on my stuffed, pillow-like horse to watch Captain Kangaroo or the Lone Ranger turned from cute to too much.  I had other childhood occupations besides spending time outdoors with friends. One was practicing my piano from the age of three on; starting at 15 minutes a day with time off on Christmas and my birthday.  The other was being taken to the library–a big old Carnegie building with iron stairs and oak stacks–to pick out 5 books a week to read. There was a stint with ballet and tap and swimming lessons. Eventually, I learned that all mom’s childrearing literature at the time I was weaned from afternoon cartoons was filled with tales of the boob tube and fat, dull children who had been hooked in to it for hours a day. My mother wasn’t going to be caught raising fat, dull children. There was too much status at stake during that time in America.

I also remember when I was a young mom I had absolute dread when being begged to run the same Barney tape over and over. It was as bad as the continual whining about Rainbow Brite or My Little Ponies or what ever mass marketing TV toy of the day.  The real shocker was finding out how so many kids seemed to have nearly uniform expressions of glee when any where near the golden arches.  That included mine even when I was hand making all of the baby food and growing it in the backyard garden. I got motivated quickly to stack my daughters’ rooms full of nature items, books, and musical instruments.  We had a 5400 square foot house with one TV and thousands of books in hundreds of books shelves. TVs are not allowed anywhere near dinner tables or kitchens in my home.  There was  and is that same piano that both my mom and I played and games.  At some point, I got that boob tube message loud and clear too.

We got an IBM peanut when doctor daughter was about two and the one cartridge of child friendly software mostly had numbers and shapes on a very primitive level.  Dr. Daughter had to learn to work a keyboard the same way she learned piano.  That would be one key and one connected image at a time.  That’s like 25 years ago and it’s as much a world of difference from that time as it is from me sitting on the family room floor with a toy guy blazing watching Kemo Sabe get the bad guy one more time.  The boob tubes are much more sophisticated. I can only imagine any potential grandchildren I may have will have much more engaging boobtubes as the technology develops.

I have to admit that I spend hours in front of my PC doing work, playing games, and socializing. Even though it is much more interactive than Captain Kangaroo, it’s an isolating and nonphysical experience on the whole. It’s also quite addicting.  I remember graphic computer novel games–like Zork–used to keep me up at night. I call youngest daughter and she’s on the WII trying to take on the latest version of Zelda.  That happens at all hours and pretty much every time I call for about a period of a week. Thankfully, all three of us still retreat to our pianos and books which might actually be seen as earlier versions of boobtubes if you think about it.

Still, it makes you think when you see stuff like this.

THE average American spends at least eight and a half hours a day in front of a screen, Nicholas Carr notes in his eye-opening book “The Shallows,” in part because the number of hours American adults spent online doubled between 2005 and 2009 (and the number of hours spent in front of a TV screen, often simultaneously, is also steadily increasing).

The average American teenager sends or receives 75 text messages a day, though one girl in Sacramento managed to handle an average of 10,000 every 24 hours for a month. Since luxury, as any economist will tell you, is a function of scarcity, the children of tomorrow, I heard myself tell the marketers in Singapore, will crave nothing more than freedom, if only for a short while, from all the blinking machines, streaming videos and scrolling headlines that leave them feeling empty and too full all at once.

I’ve just learned about a phenomenon called ‘internet rescue camp’ and ‘freedom software’ that helps netizens learn to disconnect.  I don’t want to disconnect. I have to admit that I can’t last through TV programs very much these days.  Going to a movie at a theatre is akin to a dentist trip for me.  I have the blackberry–crackberry–out within about 10 minutes looking for the latest twitter news or checking my email.  My blackberry has given me adult attention deficit disorder but I call it multi-tasking.  I can only imagine how bad I would be with a tablet and wifi. My kids aren’t much better.  I can’t get youngest daughter away from texting and 2 minute shout outs on the phone.  When the house fills up at Mardi Gras time, I discover just how much young adults text each other these days.  My daughter panics if she doesn’t have her phone on her at all times.  She might miss something earth shattering.

So, that article that I’m quoting is at the NYT.  It’s called ‘The Joy of Quiet’ and was sent to me by an old friend.   He knew me before I refused to go anywhere without internet connections.  I wonder what that says?

The central paradox of the machines that have made our lives so much brighter, quicker, longer and healthier is that they cannot teach us how to make the best use of them; the information revolution came without an instruction manual. All the data in the world cannot teach us how to sift through data; images don’t show us how to process images. The only way to do justice to our onscreen lives is by summoning exactly the emotional and moral clarity that can’t be found on any screen.

The author brings up one of my other long time activities; meditation.  I still escape to books.  I can spend hours still playing the piano.  It’s why gigging was the perfect antidote to working at the FED for me.  Right now, I’m reading 1Q84. This is a great pleasure for me given how much of my reading has been dedicated to scholarly articles the last few years. I snuck in all three of Larsson triology last summer too despite the pressures to get the dissertation done.  I still can’t believe I got my first masters with just a mainframe and tons of error messages on greenbar paper that had to be deconstructed by a computer person.  I get data from the Fed in two keystrokes now.  It used to take me days down in the university library basement where the government docs were stored.  I had to go through hundreds of Beige Books.  That didn’t even count the time it took to get stuff from nominal to real.  That’s not even a two minute activity these days.

The thing that has always historically defined our species is our use of tools.  It’s basically contributed mightily to the evolution of human intelligence from the time we first picked up sticks and stones.  Our cousins the great apes also use them.  However, what also defines us is our social displays.  We and our great ape cousins show empathy,  demonstrate a sense of humor, and thrive around friends and relations. We make love and war with tools and with out them.   So, not only do I play games to get my mind off of life, I Skype friends all over the world.  I also think, therefore, I blog.  It’s one of those chicken and egg things. Do we define our tools or do our tools define us?  Some times, it’s very hard to tell.