…a new way to converse with one another.
I looked at my children the other night, standing around in the kitchen–each one of them had their heads hung, looking at a device. For my smallest, it was a 3DS; my daughter, her IPOD; my two boys, phones. Even my husband was swinging his neck to look at his phone screen. I exclaimed how they all looked–ridiculous. Granted, I do it too…but it’s crazy. It’s too much. Do you know my two youngest boys have withdrawal if they don’t have a device in their hands all the time? And can you imagine the number it’s doing on your vertebrae?
So I was talking to my fourth son in birth order. He was telling on his sister about typing something on Snapchat. Snapchat? What? What is this and how does she have an account? I’m not an old fogey, but I do like to have a say on what social media she’s on. There are too many predators out there to think it’s all innocent–which is what young girls believe it is, and should be. Anyway, he continues to say that Snapchat is an outlet in which once the person views the message, it vanishes. Hmm….okay. So let’s recap; Instagram is for pictures– Facebook is to proclaim what type of mood you’re in or kind of day you’re having, or what you’re eating–Pinterest is for pinning special photos to boards you want to keep–Twitter is to advertise (let’s face it, no one does much more than this)–and now Snapchat is to correspond with people and then have it disappear. Kind of like a secret message that self-destructs. Interesting. How many others ways can they dream up to communicate with one another that doesn’t involve physical human interaction? Hearing someone’s voice is almost obsolete anymore.
I suppose speed is the new thing. And the internet, of course is the highway for it all. After all, it’s how I’m communicating now. But why can’t you just not tell the world every single detail of your life? Every second of the day? Why can’t you hold it all in, for say a week, and then give a person a call and have a good talk on the phone. Like we used to. I feel the world is getting to be a bit too much in your business. Don’t get me wrong, I stalk Facebook to see what everyone is doing. Doesn’t mean it isn’t a sad pastime. It’s sort of funny because if I see Facebook people out on the street, I feel like it’s a weird celebrity sighting. As if you’re following their life through the media and now they’re there in the flesh. Like ‘hey, I saw you the other night at that restaurant eating spaghetti. I was happy to read the doctor’s visit checked out great!’. But it’s not always a good thing. You see their status and you feel like you’ve checked in with them. You don’t need to give them a call to connect personally…you know what they’re up to already. You’ve checked the ‘like’ button and all is up to date.
They say Snapchat is going to trump the other social media icons by having 150 million users. 150 million!!! People want speed and direct ability to chat with a single person, then have it go away. Hey, here’s a notion…wait until something earth-shattering happens to you, then call them! I would be shocked to know how many relationships rely more on technology than person-to-person. It makes me happy I dated in the phone age. Where I heard the voice of the other person, and gushed on the one side of the telephone connection–staying up all night, talking about everything. And I didn’t have to guess their tone. Have you ever read a message from someone and wondered what the whole capitalization was for? Let’s face it, capital letters show tone. Was it an accident they typed ‘VERY tired’? Does that mean they don’t want to text now? And why didn’t he/she comment on that last text? Did they not get it? When in fact, they didn’t, but you assume they didn’t like your comment and now it was up to you to backtrack. Yep, I’m grateful I had use of the phone during my dating years. Well, kind of. I remember a few times it would’ve been nice to send a Snapchat for an easy break-up! 🙂
