(Left): “Oh, yeah, it was a great descent. I went so fast my helmet flew off.” (Right): Soaking after a 20-mile ride somewhere southwest of Eureka, Nev.
(Jim #22) — I’m sorry if you’ve e-mailed me recently. The same goes for voice mails.
You could have sent me something by regular mail, and I wouldn’t have read it. It would be sitting on the counter where I tossed everything else that was pulled from the mailbox.
I just let it all sit there for a while. You’d be surprised how easy it was. Then again, there was a lingering pang. Am I being rude and selfish? Am I missing some key opportunity or crucial bit of information?
It was kind of a social experiment, though much of the impetus came from “I just don’t even want to look at a computer right now.” Plus, I was traveling. Stepping back in time in the middle of Nevada. Riding my motorcycle to Mount Shasta. Jamming with friends in Sacramento.
I may no longer have a layer of structured work e-mails to deal with, but I’m still immersed in a number of projects and activities that are highly important to me. In other words, I feel like e-mail is just as crucial to me as ever.
We make connections with people using the tools of e-mail and phones, but they’re not like what we experience “in person” with others. An e-mail or text message or phone conversation could actually have more depth than an in-person experience, but it’s still quite a different animal. I assume what many of us deeply crave are meaningful connections with people that occur when we’re physically in each other’s space.
But in order to have those connections, it’s probably best if we feel like there’s a good margin of time for us. We probably don’t want to feel rushed or preoccupied. Yet e-mails and phone calls chew up large chunks of time and can contribute to that feeling of not having enough time for everything.
It’s kind of a challenging situation, and I think really wise people handle it by being gracefully deliberate. “Hey, I’m so glad you called, but I’m sitting down for lunch right now. Is there a good time I can call you back?” Or maybe they say everything they need to in two sentences of an e-mail.
I’m not very good at being gracefully deliberate, so sometimes I fall back on the total plug-out method. It’s a crude way of gaining some sort of control, I guess.
When I’m in the company of others I feel much better if I’m totally present. I’ll never figure out what the teenage boy next to me was getting out of his endless text conversation during the “Diving Bell and the Butterfly” film event at the Cascade Theatre a few months ago. I mean, even if the person he was texting was the hottest girl on the planet, why not take her to the event? Why not text just enough to figure out the next place you’re going to meet in person? Or maybe it’s just the digital passing of love notes, and I’m really an old guy. (Still, that blue screen of his popping up every two seconds was driving me crazy. I was within my right to tell him to put it away, but I actually wanted to see how long he’d do it. I felt like I was in the Zits cartoon.)
So, anyway, now I’m plugging back in. Next I gotta get to those e-mails. Digital connections are important as well. But I’ll tell you what — unplugging is actually a good way to recharge.
Just so you know, the more you ‘unplug,’ the more it means I’m stuck with numb-nuts. And as we both know, he never unplugs.
Probably time for BG to hook up some broadband out there in level land. Just sayin’ is all.
While you were gone;
the old gray cat had kittens,
we made us some real fine chitlins,
though we were real proud of that,
we weren’t half-as-proud as the cat.
Just don’t hit that ignore button.
Mmmmm. Chitlins.
Mmmm, chitlins – and MAN SOUP!