Apparently we love our own cell phones but we hate everyone else's. -Joe Bob Briggs
It is amazing how technology sneaks into our lives. We are seduced by its promise to make things better for us. It seems to make work more efficient. It seems to make life easier. We master it....that is, we seem to master it until it does not work and then we come to the terrible realization that it masters us. Our dependency on it has become so complete that we have become slaves to it.What brings on such thoughts, you may ask? Yesterday my husband flew into New York to work. I had not heard from him all day, which is not unusual when he goes to the customer first and begins fixing the machine with which they are having difficulty. It is tradition that we talk every night around our daughter's bedtime, if he is in the country. We call him, if he does not call first.
Last night, the Princess called him to say good-night and had to leave a message. Typically, my husband will call back immediately, even while she is leaving a message, but that did not happen last night. I allowed her to stay up an extra fifteen minutes waiting and then I tried again myself, also leaving a message. The Princess went to bed and we prayed together, which is what Daddy does when he is home.
I watched an hour TV show I had started to record just an hour earlier, I prefer to watch recordings than live—It is so nice to fast forward through those commercials and watch it all in only 45 minutes instead of an hour! Then I tried to call again, still no answer. Now I am getting a bit concerned. At 10:30 p.m. I looked up the email message he forwarded to me with all his travel itinerary and called the hotel. After allowing it to ring about twelve times, someone answered and confirmed that my husband had just checked in thirty minutes ago. My call was put through to his room and my fears faded away with the sound of his voice. His cell phone, for whatever reason, was not working, he said. How dare his cell phone not work!
You know, for years I resisted cell phones because of health factors associated with electromagnetic radiation, but eventually I relented not just for convenience, but out of necessity. Just try finding a working public phone these days! However, the average phone call for me on my cell is under two minutes, most of them are under one minute and I usually only use it about once or twice a month and only my family and a handful of people have my number. When I use the cell, it is for just telling someone I will be late, coordinating with my husband where to meet, or to get some directions because my GPS is not getting me there. (Yes, I have an old model of one of those too.)
My cell is on my purse, not on my body. I do worry about how much my husband is required to use his and how it is always clipped on at the waist, but now I worry more if it does not work, because in my mind, it is more than just a means of communication, but it is part of him—or he is part of it. Perhaps we all are being integrated into the Matrix with every upgrade in technology that makes our lives more convenient, thus more independent on it.
Think your not a slave to technology? Just try going a week without using any of it at all.
My Lord, let me not be a slave to technology but to use it wisely. Thank you for being with my husband at all times, whether I can talk with him or not.
