"Over Connected"

The world has officially become overly connected.

 

We crossed the line last Tuesday, while I was at a shopping mall.  While enjoying the requisite Chinese food we all get at the mall, I watched children on the carousel. 

 

That's when the "line breech" became official.

 

Not one...two moms on the carousel were on their cell phones.

 

The teenage girl manning the carousel was also on her cell phone.  Remember, she was on the clock.

 

Forget races, religions and countries, the world is now made up of just two kinds of people, those with cell phones and those who refuse to be entirely available to the world no matter the time, place or nature of where they are.

 

The famous Hollywood types are making names for themselves walking around text messaging their "friends," yapping on cell phones, endorsing phones that are slim enough to fit in a back pocket without making your behind look any bigger.  And because the Hollywood folks do it, so does everyone else.

 

Look at the world now.  You can't go inside a store without hearing someone's personal conversations, which are being shouted into a tiny microphone that sticks out of an ear peace placed inside someone's ear.  The frozen food aisles are littered with the seemingly schizophrenic masses, talking to themselves about what they need for dinner tonight.  Restaurants are full of people who never speak to their dates because they're on the phone with friends who want to know how the date is going.  Let's not forget the thousands of people who are chatting while driving.

 

What has happened to the members of the human race that makes our need to be connected so overpowering?  We leave all sense of decency and humanity behind so that we can talk to our friends while we ride a carousel with our children.  Why?

 

It seems as though the "cell phone people" are in constant need of approval or accolades for everything they do.  They need their friends to know they've taken the kids to the mall and that they're all happy and smiling on the carousel.  They need their friends to know that they're on their way home from work and that they're in the car and can you believe what so-and-so did today.  They're in the grocery store and didn't bother to make a list of what they need so they call home to ask.

 

Those who can live their lives without cell phones are living their lives with self-sufficiency.  They can drive from one place to the other knowing that if they get lost or break down or get board, they can take care of themselves.  They can sit on the carousel and watch their children shriek with joy without needing to call their best friend to tell her.  They can make a list to take to the grocery store and they can return to the store if they need to.

 

A companion phenomenon, the "cell phone" people and those without don't mix.  Husbands and wives are either cell phone folk or not.  Circles of friends are splitting up based on cell phone habits, and rightly so.

 

The choice to yak away on a cell phone in public is a matter of dignity and taste.  Choosing to be somewhere else or choosing to live in the moment so those who are physically around you are capable of communicating with you is a matter of good upbringing. 

 

This pop tart has been a part of both groups, but she can attest that life without the constant connectivity is sweeter.