I’ve had my iPhone for less than a week and its already vastly changed the way I use my computer. Funny that. Historically, the first thing I would do when I came into the house would be head to my laptop and see what’s up. Email, RSS, Ravelry account, blog comments if applicable.
Now my email filters into my pocket with serene little blips wherever I am. At least wherever I am that has cell or wi-fi coverage, and around about here, that’s everywhere. My feeds are fed to me in the car or on the way to school. Web wherever. Damn useful while trouble shooting a computer at a client’s house. His computer is out of commission but Apple’s support site is sitting in the palm of my hand.
Now I come into the house and go straight to my laptop and... well... I stare at it for a second and realize that I have no business here. Not right now. Maybe I’ve got a blog to type up and some database entries to fix, but nothing that can’t wait until after I have a cup of tea and Luke has a snack. The urgent stuff is in handled, noted, dealt with.
My husband and I were already constantly touching base throughout the day. Chat, text, call. Tweet too. (That’s a new one for me. I’m mostly eavesdropping right now to see if what twitter drops my way is worth catching, but I’m swingbug over in the TwitterVerse, if you care.) When we all sit down at the dinner table, the first thing we say is, “What did you do today?” but with the exception of Luke who doesn’t yet type, or at least doesn’t harness his spelling skills when he does it, we’re already past the bullet points and on to plot exposition. We’ve been out of physical contact but not communication. Now we elucidate in lines that contain more than 140 characters.
It changes, you know? When I was a kid, computers were for homework and games like Oregon Trail. When I was in high school, a kid in my speech class gave a talk about the “Information Super Highway” and we had no idea what he was talking about. By college, I had three email accounts. Now our various online digital devices are how the family reads the news and fiction and poetry. It’s how we communicate with friends and family, near and far. It’s a vehicle for learning, creating, growing.
The way we accumulate and process information evolves as quickly as the information itself. So say we all.
Late on a weeknight. Shawn has just gotten the kiddo to sleep and collapses on the couch with his iPhone. I have just finished corralling the chaos of the living room and collapse next to him.
“Why don’t you unplug for a bit?”
Shawn shakes his iPhone at me. “Wireless.”
“Disconnect, then. An iPhone can’t do everything for you, you know.”
“That’s why 3.0 supports peripherals.”
“Very funny.”
“I thought so.”
And two iPhones go to sleep.