I first started college in the fall of 1996–back before I had a clue about what I wanted to do. I just liked writing and hadn’t yet put two and two together. This was long before the age of social media and cell phones. Very few had cell phones and if they did, they certainly didn’t stare at them 24/7. I could walk down a hall and see a person’s entire face, not just stare at whether or not they were balding. A person would say “excuse me,” when they bumped into you and not just stare at you in puzzlement before returning that zombie-like stare to whatever device happens to be in their hands.
I’m nursing a foot injury, so I have the ability to park in the parking garage between Alkek and McCoy. What’s interesting about this is that the area doesn’t see a large amount of auto traffic, though it does see a great amount of foot traffic. The old “watch where you’re going,” phrase is something that needs to be shouted rather loudly in this area–and I don’t mean at the cars. The problem is that these pedestrians wouldn’t hear you because they all have some form of headphones plugged into their handheld devices that they’re staring so intently at as they meander unwittingly towards certain demise.
It’s an interesting thing seeing how something like social media is preventing so many from being social in their own immediate environments. I even see this with my own children and it scares me. I don’t want life to run them over while they’re living in an artificial world.
Written by Kat 