Tactile

Am I a dying breed?

I read newspapers and books.  I print pictures I take.  I mail birthday cards.

I won’t argue if you think I’m a tad old-fashioned, hanging on to a life and style no longer considered normal, new and modern.  I agree completely and wholeheartedly.  I AM hanging on to a life and style no longer considered normal, new and modern.  I am not evolving and I’m being rather stubborn about it.  Oh well.

I like touching things:  to anxiously turn pages of books while curled up in bed; to quietly rifle through the weekend newspapers endless cup of coffee in hand; to nostalgically pour over photo albums with a laugh and a tear; to carefully write addresses out on envelopes and pop them in the post (how’s that for an old-fashioned sentence).  I don’t want these little life pleasures to go the way of the dodo where everything is stored in some imaginary Neverland that doesn’t really exist. Where IS it?  I want to touch it.  I need to touch it so I know it’s real and not some magic trick of the eye or slight of hand. 

I wonder where I would have been in eras past, poo-pooing modern inventions as common tricks of the local charlatan.  Well, I’ll tell you:  riding a horse, lighting candles, writing telegrams, watching silent movies and living large as a complete curmudgeon.  

I wonder if Thoreau had it right, eschewing modern society and invention and heading off to Walden Pond in search of a simple life and simplified lifestyle.  Well, he may have had it right for him but that’s obviously not the move for me (cabin.  woods.  alone.  two. years.)  I’m all over modern conveniences like the world wide web, air travel, the Blackberry, iPod (oh yeah, an original 4G which – by the grace of God & Bono, yes, I know, not the same thing - is still rocking), running water and the like but I’m not entirely keen on losing everything that once was in order to make room for what will be, especially when that new thing doesn’t seem to actually be anything.  Don’t you miss records?  Talking on the phone?  Writing letters?  I do.  I miss all of it.  So I’m keeping what I can because I want to hang on – to literally hang on - to things I can see, feel and touch.  As things move forward, I’m stepping back.  I think that’s rather revolutionary.