As a society, we are fascinated by
gadgets of all kinds. Laptop computers, digital cameras, iPods,
BlackBerries are our new best friends. We take them with us wherever we go, we gaze at them lovingly, we we share our deepest secrets with them. Even those of us who are
technological dinosaurs, tend to at least be hip enough to have a
cell phone. But, like any new drug, our high-tech toys come with potentially serious side effects.
Most of you have heard that studies
have linked cell phone usage with brain damage and tumors, especially
in children. But that's not exactly the kind of brain damage I'm referring
to. I'm talking about behavioral rather than anatomical and
physiological brain damage. You know – the kind of damage that,
despite healthy
neurological tissue, leaves us acting like social
morons. What ever became of manners, discretion, common courtesy?
Are social skills, like eight-track tapes and mullets, simply destined to
become a thing of the past? And why exactly am I going on and on about this?
Well, I was recently reminded of how our love affair with electronic gadgetry can turn us into blubbering idiots. Let me share with you a tale of electronic be-witchery and human frailty.......a cautionary tale if you will.
I was in Sears the other day, walking
from the shoe department to the children's department with my two
kids in tow. As we passed the registers (centrally located for no
one's convenience) a young woman came out of the children's
department walking toward us, chatting away loudly on her cell
phone. The sales clerks, my two eight-year-olds and I were treated
to her end of the conversation which went like this:
