The way we communicate these days was brought in focus for me as I traveled from Delaware to Florida and back the past two weeks. Of course my laptop was Velcro-ed (is that a word?) to my lap and I was never far from an electric outlet. When visiting friends, after the initial “Hello’s” and “How are you’s,” was the “Do you have wireless in the house?” Many, but not all, of us are becoming slaves to our electronic communication tools and I love mine! Being connected to a whole host of others brings the world up close and personal for me.
But when there was no connectivity for my laptop it got me thinking about those days when they didn’t even have pony express, Either you sent someone somewhere with a message (written or memorized) or you went yourself. I imagine the decision making process was slowed down quite a bit. It was a very small world indeed. While rail and mail sped things up considerably it still took about a month for the entire nation to find out that Lincoln had been assassinated.
With the invention of the telephone and telegraph the speed of communication was considered an awesome thing. Imagine, you could actually speak to your cousin in New York while you were sipping Pina Colada’s in Palm Springs, California! What next?
The internet of course! I recall being absolutely astounded that I could type in a few words on my computer, enter a weird @ something address and send the written word to Moscow in a nanosecond! Sure I could pick up the phone and call, but hey, this email stuff is speed of light transportation of the written word all around the world. And, if you’ve scanned in your signature you can even sign a document and return it in a matter of seconds! Now that is awesome, truly awesome. We get used to that kind of convenience and rightly so, for we are in an electronic age and to not embrace it is akin to still using an outhouse rather than the inside toilet.
Being used to my speed of light electronic communication I found myself rather annoyed when I had to open the internet and type in my www.something address to read my favorite blog. Slowed things down considerably. But, lo and behold (that’s an archaic expression meaning “Guess what?”) I found out that I could sign up to receive the blog via email! No more multiple steps to find the blog. Nor did I have to check every day to see if she had written something new because if she did it just came into my email in-box and I opened it and enjoyed. I know about RSS feed, and that works too, but the email is just so much more convenient for me.
So, if you are like me and want to receive this blog by email, just select the “email subscription” link in the upper right corner and sign up or sign on! I’d love to have you. I still wonder what may be next on the commmunication horizon, but for me right now this is all good stuff and good enough!