Giving Up The Old For The New

What we do in life changes constantly. In this age of new technology every day we abandon the old and accept the new, sometimes without ever giving it thought, constantly and happily. I remember when I was a kid and board games were the rage for everyone, young and old. People played them to relax, but now board games are gone and computer game have replaced them. Oddly, I loved board games but have never liked or played computer games. But I am the exception in most things, not just in adapting to change. I confess to being a little to slow to give up the familiar and even slower to adapt to the new. However, eventually we all adapt and accept a great number of new things.

In this age we accept the new and throw out the old if the new is more convenient for us. Never mind whether it is better for us. An example of this is how people abandoned reading for TV when TV first became standard. I doubt anyone would claim that watching TV is better for exercising the brain than is reading a book. But it is easier. We dumb down to a lower level because of that. perhaps it is human nature at work. Sometimes quality is improved by the new. Medicine and transportation are two examples. I don't think you can find anyone who would rather ride a horse to a destination than fly by jet. We don't have to evaluate the change from horse to jet because it is obvious that the former is not as good for us as the latter.

When we don't have an obvious advantage between old and new we have a tendency to just accept the new. It is sometimes to our detriment to do so. An example of embracing the new and ousting the old when we lose more than we gain is plastic. How many times do we buy a product made of plastic, formerly made of metal or some other material, and find it breaks soon after purchase. That toddler's plastic tricycle is not nearly as comfortable, durable or as safe for the child as the old, heavy metal tricycles. but manufacturers don't give us a choice between the old metal and the new plastic bike. The older version today is far more costly, if we can even find it to buy. So we accept the plastic tricycle without much thought about it.

As a result, there are a lot of things we used to do and enjoy that we don't do anymore. In my own life here are a few. I no longer... print photos (I miss that and love having a picture in hand rather than on line); write letters by hand, spend a couple of hours reading a newspaper (newspapers are so small and have so little information I now read one if less than 30 minutes); wash my car in my driveway by myself, use an encyclopedia that is not digital, book by visiting a travel agent (It was fun and made the trip seem more personal than booking on line); fix broken things (It's cheaper to buy another one); play a record on a photograph (It sounded better that way); see aTV show that foes not involve vulgar language or crude behavior, or some form of negativity; notice the silence (machines make our lives filled with constant noise); open a door for a lady (It's considered chauvinistic to do it); smile and say hello to strangers (Some will be offended if I do); accept fault and blame (Today we are told it's always someone else's fault); wait three weeks for a package to be delivered; buy anything electric without worrying about my "carbon footprint"; waiting excitedly for the weekly sport event on TV (there are games on live non stop now, ruining all excitement  about a "big game"); conversation that is not peppered with news of trivial celebrity nonsense....

Life is changed by technology, which changes even manners and opinions of the day. It's a lot more complicated to be alive today, and I am not sure that is better for us.