Reflections and Nightmares- Irene A Waters (writer and memoirist)

Artist Charles Blackman photo © irene waters 2016

Devoid of ideas I resorted to asking my husband for something I still do in an old fashioned, analog way. I don’t wash the clothes as depicted above although I do remember a time in the past where they were.  I have gone with the times, embracing technology, although, not always with glee. I believe that unless you keep up with the changes as they happen, the eventual headache will be of splitting proportions when eventually there is no choice but to take them on as the world insists on the use of technology to function in it. Even such basic functions such as freehand  writing are becoming a lost art, at least to me.

My husband’s answer surprised me as I had not looked inwards for an answer. He immediately said “you are patient, don’t blow your own trumpet, respectful and non-judgmental.” Just by writing this I feel as though I am blowing my own trumpet but it made me think. Perhaps our emotions and our way of being can be either analog or digital also.

Let’s take patience. In the analog age there was no choice but to be patient. We had sayings “a watched pot never boils” and most of us lived this way. We didn’t have credit cards and had to save our money to purchase anything we wanted. Items weren’t disposable and were highly valued because of the amount of labour that went into their purchase. In the digital age items are disposable and purchased then and there,  often on a whim and on a credit card. The joy they give lasting until the next item is desired.  The digital age doesn’t have the patience to wait but rather demands instant gratification. This instant gratification is required across all facets of life and if it is not forthcoming, rather than persevere until the task, skill, purchase is mastered, the digitals will move on to something else.

Blowing your own trumpet is both good and bad. Growing up in what can only be described as a Victorian household we were taught to be seen and not heard as children. In the digital age children are forefront and are often the focus of the conversation, the children controlling the adults. As an analog age non trumpeter there are definite drawbacks. One obvious one is the marketing of myself as an author. I just cannot tell you how wonderful I am or the book is. The digital age author has no such problems. However, for the digital age child getting knock backs and criticisms must be so much more difficult because they are going to fall from a far greater height than those from the analog age.

Respectful and non-judgemental I believe, despite my husband, are attributes that can belong equally to both analog and digital age people. I have met some young people who I have been most impressed with and others I have not. At the same time there are those from the analog age, my age, that hold extremist viewpoints. It boils down, I believe, to exposure to the world and the knowledge that the world over, people are people with the same basic needs and desires.

However, I believe that when these ways of being are put in combination the digital age are far more likely to react violently and with rage. We have road rage, one hit punches and worse in the United States where, without gun control, personal rage (often in the name of terrorist groups) kill countless numbers of innocent people such as we saw in Orlando recently. If this is the digital age of emotion I’m glad I’m still in analog.

In response to weekly discover challenge.