How to use this Page

Over waffles and child shenanigans Saturday morning, Jim Dear showed me a story in the paper about the Borders Books on West End closing. Unlike Davis Kidd, which was always there, I remember clearly the birth of the West End Borders. Jim Dear and I had just gotten married and felt lucky to be renting a house in the artsy enclave of Hillsboro Village. We jealously guarded our ability to walk to everything and waited anxiously for the opening of Borders.... how wonderful to have a bookstore we could stroll to on a Friday evening! Over the years we spent Friday nights at Borders and Sunday afternoons at Davis Kidd.

The word on the street is that Borders took too late to the online retail environment. And it's true, as part of their brand, Borders believed in the in-store experience - they were the first to have a cafe, the first to offer wireless internet. But even the hippest coffee and the tastiest muffins could not compete with the double punch of ebooks and people preferring to shop from their La-Z-boys.

Sigh.... technology

I'm not a crusader against technology in publishing. I AM a book lover and therefor don't see an ebook reader in my near future, but I do think that e-readers fill a niche in the market place for people who can muster the energy only to thumb "next page." These individuals, unable to summon the strength to crack a paperback let alone balance a 200 page novel beside their smart phones and remote controls, are truly sympathetic creatures. Aside from the obvious deterioration of upper body strength I would be concerned about how this technology, which is galloping closer to the under 5 set, impacts a person's ability to understand the natural world. Wonder why? Consider this: when an 18 month old sees mom's hand grab a page, move it through the air and then allow it to fall slowly into another place he sees a physics lesson in motion. When a 5 year old drops a paperback and board book on his sisters head and hears the different thunks they make, he learns another. So what? He can learn the same lesson from his toys, right? True, unless his toys are replaced.... one by one.... with electronic gadgets and apps. A recent acquaintance, whose youthful parents were raised on a steady diet of TV and video games, and who are making sure to bring only the best binary code to their child, visited our neighborhood and remarked on the rocks in our back field.
"Wow! where did those come from?"
"Well," was the reply, "they were dug up when the neighborhood was built."
"Cool! so you could just dig one out and roll it down there?"

Riiaaaahhhhhhgggt.

The rocks in question are 800 pound boulders that can't be moved unless you had a crane to do it. Now commentary of this nature could be understandable coming from a three year old. But this person is older than that, and certainly old enough to have experienced an actual rock. However just like Borders' "customers" this person has eschewed the "in-world experience" for a virtual life.... and at the same time has forfeited the knowledge that a boulder the size of a VW is not something you casually rearrange in the landscaping. This is the same mentality as that of people who build enormous million dollar houses in the wilderness and then get annoyed when bears and wild fires show up without a casserole. When we are clumsy with it, technology steals more of the natural world from us. My concern is that, as the generations pass, Baby Sprout is going to be on a date with some bozo who thinks that he can pull the car just a little too close to the edge of Make-out Lookout and not put the emergency break on. If the car starts rockin' and the wheels start rolling and the car starts sliding.... I don't think there's an app to stop that.
0 Comments on Sketchbook Sunday - is there an app for that? as of 1/1/1900