Thursday, May 5, 2011

Modern Day Couple


As I sit on my back porch enjoying a perfectly beautiful gloomy day, I notice my neighbor on her cell phone. Soon after joins her partner who also decides to take advantage of this moment and begins chatting his way on his technological passage to the modern world as we know it.
I see this as a very common escape to the majority of couples today. Finding a way to just be together but not being able to handle the rawness of each others' true company, so they pass the time on their phones or perhaps watching something whether on the internet, TV, or if your feeling daring, actually leaving your current residence, venturing into the outside world and going to the movies, where you will sit in silence and are entertained by the propaganda that is feeding your brain.

I once went to a restaurant where I saw a couple enjoying each others' company. The gentleman in question spent the entirety of the meal on
his mobile (which of course I am sure was a very important call that if he had not taken it could have put an end to the world that he had created for  himself and in which he was "happy.")while the lady sat in silence eating her meal and watching all the passerby's.

Why are we so uncomfortable in each others' company? The internet, the biggest social outlet, has made us introverts. People who generally would never have been able to speak to each other somehow muster the courage to approach you there. Unfortunately, while relationships are developing so well on the internet, when the time comes for actual human interaction, you wonder why the person isn't the same as they were when you 'met them.' Well the very simple explanation is you never actually 'met them.' You never saw or even heard any real emotion. People are so clever. Clever enough to know if your having a bad day you can 'shut it off' on the internet and be as charming as you want while speaking on it. The catch is though, that they really didn't 'shut it off,' you just can't hear them or feel the torment that they might be going through at that moment. True, at times this could be a very precious gift, especially in the beginning of a relationship when you don't necessarily want that person knowing what an absolute 'nut' you really are. Now you'll begin to fantasize about meeting this person and make plans for it to happen (if your really smitten).  When the meeting does occur you wonder why you have nothing to talk about. How were your conversations so long when you were chatting online? I have a question, have you ever read one of your hour and half conversations that you have had online? Believe it or not it won't take you more that five or ten minutes to read through the entire conversation. The internet has this magical way of prolonging the inevitable. The internet is such a distracting wonderland that you didn't realize that you were perhaps surfing the internet, E-mailing, or even doing some mundane task all during this intimate conversation. Of course when you are actually with this person you must give them your undivided attention and really how boring is that?

O.K. Lets not be too pessimistic. There is always the need for human touch every now and again. You might even be one of the lucky ones who has such incredible chemistry with this person that you are meeting for the fist time, that you are lost in their embrace and all the affection they so generously bestow upon you before you realize that there was absolutely no communication. (hey I'm not judging) Realize it or not at that moment you very soon will, because even that magical spark will eventually dwindle and you'll be right back at the beginning. Do you see the error here? Probably not as you log back in to your world of communication and begin all over again.

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