Upon moving to the Seattle area almost five years ago I became in tune to how social interaction is best kept polite and quick here; text and or by email. Keep it social, keep it Internet
Oh, and what you don't know?
Google it! No, you Google it
They're a techy bunch, even for what was 2011.
My Midwest affability and manurisms were quickly put to rest, when for example asking a Seattleite for the time was a look returned that might of well of had me asking,
"Can I kill your family?"
At the grocery store when the cashier asks how my day is, before I could respond with a good and.....
"Great. Thanks, have a great day!"
When he was caught the second time around notorious serial killer and former UW student Ted Bundy said he thought he'd never get caught because, and I'm paraphrasing, he never thought people were paying attention to each other in the PNW.
Interesting food for thought from a homicidal maniac who had described The Green River to a T before he was caught.A homicidal clock is right once in its life?
I digress.
Of course the reality is Seattle is no different then anywhere in America in that as the Doors said "People are strange, when you're a stranger."
A song every newcomer to Seattle relates to
Maybe because I'm a "transplant" as they say, that I feel strange.
We are all strange by default. It's a good thing. Like doing the speed limit when advertised.
And we do it to each other at times, being strangers, not knowing the squares in our pocket are turning us into just that, squares. I include myself.
That's not to say people don't speak on the phone or face to face (attributes the mafia used to deter getting caught I might add) here in the Pacific Northwest.
I can count numerous times I'm behind either a Honda or Subaru (The state cars of Washington) only to find some over Caffeinated, but not foot-on-the-gas pedal driver, who equates slow lane with passing lane and vice versa) on their cell phones nonchalantly chatting away as traffic is slowly building, and its anger rises.
I remembered moving to this liberal, progressive hedonistic land thinking how religious fanaticism hold little sway in local politics. (They have a socialist on city council!)Pshh, Talk about Jesus thumpers, they actually believe the poor deserve housing!
Who does this guy think he is? Jesus?
I digress.
I drove to work one day passing a bus stop as I came to a red light to see about twenty people, head bowed in what looked to be reverent prayer. Upon further inspection? Nope, they were just on their cell phones. All encompassed as we all are sometimes guilty to the Walking Dead mindlessness of ignoring your surroundings and forgetting your commute to work. You have to catch up on news.
I get it.
It's in many ways our America now. Generations old and new have adapted to the times. In an age where you can meet your spouse online to ordering sexy edible lingerie over the Internet (yum), we can connect and at the same time disconnect.
As a father, I want my child to know the Internet as a tool, but people as valuable commodities.
I'm 32, about to become 33 and I can remember landlines and phones on the wall just as I equally remember AOL chat and the beginning of MySpace and Facebook.
Back then common sense wasn't an app, it was, well, all to common.Say what now?
Now it's as rare as black coffee in Seattle
("I'll have a have whip have soy, decompressed, chilled, iced to -2centigrade mocha slide with a twist of butternut oreo, with motcha and a lime please?")
Back in the day we were confused:
"Why are they calling during dinner?" My parents would ask.
It wasn't that long ago, 1995, few if any homes in America had the large brick black phone sported by Zack Morris from Saved by the Bell. If you had one you were so cool.
I feel like I'm literally a turn of the century kid, who like generations before me knew both horse and buggy and the automobile.
I will be forever grateful for our "new automobile" but the Internet is a tool, not a person, and most certainly rarely ever a community one can fully trust.
Have you read an Internet comment section. Not a misanthrope? Wait until Betty White's birthday to see Facebook comments as I did at her last.
Who doesn't like Betty White?
In fairness, she deliberately stole her denchers!
Michael Corleone said it best,
"You keep your friends close, but your enemies closer."
I read that as you 'keep your technology close, but your friends closer.'
I'm happy we live in a world were you can tune out and in to whatever is happening in the world. But, and this is a big but, not at the sake of the world around you. And I don't mean your online community. I mean your in line community.
I get the satisfaction Mick and Keith were looking for when I'm walking in the Seattle area and I say hello to a complete stranger offering a midwestern sensibility.
He looks at me not sure what to do. He doesn't have his headphones on so he can't straight ignore me. No, that would be impolite.
Maybe I get a kick out of the impromtu jovaility a stranger could offer, or maybe deep down I want a friend.
From the horse and buggy to the automobile,
The land line and face to face interaction, to words and accessibility, the world turns.
The world turns into an overall better place I feel and looking back at both "turns of the century" I have to sit back and enjoy the human advances.
Maybe I miss the patience of it all. Great songMaybe I miss the pen and paper. The getting lost without direction. The explorations of parts unknown. Say what you will about the horse and buggy and the 90's way of communicating, it always, by default, slowed you down.
Maybe that's what we need more of Seattle.
(But please, for the love of Puget Sound, not on the road!)
Now, hurry up and pick up your damn coffee, I'm double parked and late for work!
I'll take mine like my preferred time of day please, black.
Sleep up Seattle. And tune in, to each other. ;)
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