(a picture of John as he tries to resist using modern technology for 24 hours)
I tried as hard as I could to survive the 24 hour period without technology that the assignment required. However, the forces of routine eventually did me in and resulted in my falling short. I started the day off pretty well. I made it through the first five hours after waking up by a combination of reading the newspaper, playing basketball outside, and reading a few books I'm working on. Technology eventually won the war, because while in my car on the way to a trail right near my house, I absentmindedly turned on the radio and listened for the whole drive. It is such a routine to turn the car radio on that it didn't even occur to me that it was a "banned" technology. I didn't experience physical convulsions when I was off the technology wagon like Donald described, but it was extremely difficult to not think about technology. My mind was filled with all these apocalyptic thoughts about all the things I was missing in the world by not being plugged in.
I have to admit that I did not go into the assignment with the same bravado as the American University students in Danna Walker's article. I was kind of dreading the experience going into it, but it would up being pretty entertaining. I asked my parents if they could ever go twenty four hours without technology, and their responses were mixed. My mom says that she would never be able to survive without her cell phone and laptop because of her job, and that she would be bored to death. My dad said that he would probably be able to manage to do it, if he were to schedule a full day of golfing and fishing outside. He doesn't use his cell phone all that often anyway.
I think our lives are so reliant on technology these days that modern people would never be able to survive for an extended period of time without cellphones, computers, radios, etc. It isn't just a "those young people are so lazy" thing. Even my grandparents more heavily then they would ever admit on their TV, car radio, and new computer to find out what is happening in the world. Too many companies are totally dependent on computers and would be unable to operate without them. Sure, the crops would still grow and the sun would still come out, but we are too heavily invested in technology, in all areas of the culture to ever totally eliminate it from our lives.
The one thing I did take away from this assignment is the realization that the vast majority of times I check my cellphone or the internet, it is for totally trivial things that are pretty much meaningless. There are tons of times I check websites four times a day to see if they are updated, when it all actuality they have very little importance on my life. It was nice to experience a few hours without meaningless text message exchanges to my friends about fantasy football or whether they watched the James Bond marathon on SciFi Thanksgiving Day. I think our obsession with instantaneous discussion over trivial matters has also crossed over to the news media. It seems like every time Fox News, MSNBC, or CNN are on there is a "Breaking News" alert every five minutes. Back when I was younger "Breaking News" was only used to describe monumental events like 9/11 or famous deaths like when President Reagan passed away. Nowadays every time Barack Obama looks outside his window or whenever a cat gets caught in a tree it is an even worthy of a huge red alert on the screen with "Breaking News" on it.
Another concept this challenge spotlighted was our society's appetite for instant entertainment. Its hard ti imagine how lost I would feel if I had to go on a long drive or walk and didn't have my Ipod with me. Now, I don't need to have technology to entertain myself all the time, just because I didn't own things like an Ipod or an X Box 360 when I was little. I owned a Sega Genesis that was fun, but its games were nowhere near as lifelike and engrossing to play as something like a Nintendo Wii or XBox 360 that my thirteen year old cousin Brendan owns. Brendan has been firmly entrenched in these technologies since day one, at least when people my age were little we weren't quite as reliant on technology to be our friend. However, that is not to say that things haven't rapidly changed for people my age also. Who would have ever imagined that writing a blog would ever be a part of a curriculum?
