WHAT’S WRONG WITH THIS PICTURE?

The scene: Arlena and I are in a local restaurant eating our dinner and talking about the day’s events. A young couple (“young” as in we are old enough to be their parents) and their teenage son arrive and sit at the table just across from us. The waitress brings them their utensils and menus. They know what they want and quickly order. As soon as the waitress leaves to place their order, they, all three, take out their cell phones and starts playing with them.

Isn’t there something wrong with this picture or is it just my age? I remember when we had teenagers at home – yes, it was before cell phones became popular let alone, it seems, an absolute necessity for anyone over the age of ten (our ten-year-old grandson has his own phone: drives me nuts!). Even back in those dark ages it was difficult to get the girls together for family meal. It was even more difficult to get them to have a conversation with us since they believed we had absolutely no clue what real life was all about. For them it was a waste of their very precious time to deign to speak with us.

However, when those rare opportunities came for us to sit around the family dinner table and have an actual conversation, we took it. They were a captive audience whether they liked it or not. Granted, much of the conversation consisted in one- or two-word grunts rather than and serious discussions, but at least we did not squander those opportunities that came our way to talk to our daughters.

Thus, when those cell phones came out at that table across from us, any opportunity for mom and dad to talk with their teenage son went down the tubes. When dinner arrived, silence continued to prevail. It was none of my business, of course, and I should not judge even though I am; but teenagers are teenagers, and any opportunity to converse with them, even if the conversation is not very deep, should be taken.

In fact, any opportunity for face-to-face conversation should be taken: among parents and children and between the parents themselves. And while I will admit that cell phones have their place and the rest of modern technology is wonderful, we, as a people, not just we as parents, have lost something that no amount of technological expertise can replace. That is the need for us to have honest conversations with one another, real conversations, not text messages or emails. The human response – inflection, gestures and the like – cannot be replaced or replicated by technology.

We cannot get to know one another over the internet no matter how much of ourselves we reveal. The real self only comes out in real-life contact and conversation with one another. It may seem safer to hide behind technology, but what is safer is not always what is best. It is only when we let our hair down, as we used to say, and let the real self come out that we learn about the other and, in truth, we learn about ourselves.

We cannot go back to the “good old days” nor should we want to. Yet when the opportunity comes to have an honest, face-to-face conversation, with another, we should take it.