I'm down in Florida with my hubby and his family, glad to be escaping the great snow of the century in North Carolina (and beyond). It's pretty chilly for Florida, even this time of year, but I'm glad to be soaking up the sun under palm trees and beautiful, lush flowers. Being down here is the best kind of vacation...an instant relaxation mode that reminds me of trips to Myrtle Beach to visit my grandparents over the years.
Last night on our way to see The Fighter (great movie, by the way), I looked around the car and noticed that everyone was on their smart phones - mainly playing games or looking up the random fact on Google (quote of the night, "those things can make an idiot out of anybody," which is true. I'm sure one thing the smart phones are good for is eliminating those "know-it-alls" - you know who you are and I bet you think twice before throwing something out there that can be contradicted in a click of a button. However, in terms of reducing the "know-it-alls," it's probably exponentially increased the number of "I told you so-ers," of which I subscribe).
I decided not to bring a purse, which meant going cell-phoneless. So there we are, in about a 15 minute ride and I got to thinking (most likely because I was not on my phone) about how we are obsessed with our smart phones. I will be the first to admit that I love my iphone. I feel as though I could run the world with that thing - shopping, facts, books, news - anything I want with one swoosh of my finger.
But, I got to thinking about all the years I've lived without a smart phone. Thousands of miles of car rides to and from Myrtle Beach and Charlotte and when I lived in Europe, endless train rides of silence from country to country. That was even before the ipod. Of course, I had a walkman during those days, but they say that music fosters the imagination. And as someone inclined to written and verbal communications, I like to think I have a big imagination, or at least, I used to.
If you are listening to music, but not sleeping, reading or carrying on a conversation (or my favorite, eavesdropping), the only other thing to do is to look at the window. I think of all those trips up and down the state and county highways on the way to the beach -- at least twenty years worth of beautiful scenery passing me by - the elegant rustle of Spanish moss, the sharp, dry cotton fields, old farm houses abandoned - charred from better days, and acres and acres of farm land, kudzu and forests. When you live in the city, it's hard to imagine that most of this country is still farm land or forest, undeveloped - a place where at night, the longer you stare at the sky, the more stars appear.
I can recall a great many stories playing out in my mind during those trips. Memories of days and people past, hopes and longings for the future, the occasion chuckle or tear, thinking of things that happened or fretting upon bad fortune that could come. Will my children ever think like this - just totally disconnect and let their minds wander? I hate to think that I myself have lost the know-how, lost the ability to let my mind wander and sit idly for hours upon hours, doing nothing but staring out the window as streaks of yellow and green pass me by. Each trip, we would pass these large satellite conductors - I still don't even really know what they are, but they stand about 30-40 feet in the air, reaching to the sky. They looked like four big thrones - thrones for two kings and two queens, I imagined. I thought of them holding court up in those towers, high above flowing fields of cotton and tobacco. I'm sure I knew what they were ruling, perhaps I imagined them as gods in the sky, commanding us below.
Back in the day when my parents listened to Motown on the cassette deck and I didn't have to think - what did I do, I thought and dreamed and imagined. Perhaps the smart phone is helping us be more accurate, helping us train our minds or fight boredom, but how I long for those days when my mind ran wild and my first instinct wasn't to pull out the phone and slide to unlock the latest app. My first instinct was to simply open my mind and stare out, taking in the whole wild world and taking it on in my mind.
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