Cyber Humanity

I keep hearing a lot about this new thing called "Twitter". Even my hubby does it so I thought I'd check out his Twitter page to see what all the excitement was about. I read through his page and most of it were things such as, "Going to the movies", "washing and gassing the Camry", and "headed to bed". It began to tickle me a bit as I thought about everyone updating their page throughout the day and I started to tease Todd about it. I told him I was going to start my own page and post ridiculously tedious moments like "Now I am coughing", "Now I am reaching for the Kleenex", "Now I am out of Kleenex", "I am now going to the store to buy more Kleenex". Of course I was just being obnoxious, but it really began to make me think about why people want everyone to know what they are up to, and even more, why we read what everyone posts about their day. I find it fascinating that in a world so fearful of personal security being breached, we live our lives as an open book on the computer. We have online diaries where anyone can read out thoughts. We have pages on Myspace and Facebook that display our interests, pictures and friends. We even feel the need to let others know where we are and what we are doing. Could it be, that in this world of fast pace technology, that maybe we are actually lacking the social interactions that we, as humans, are designed for? Could we be reaching beyond the cyber world in hopes that someone will care about us? I have to be honest, the more I thought about this, the more I realized that it is true in my own life. Relationships over the internet can be fun, safe and even meaningful at times, but they will always lack human contact. I think we need to challenge ourselves to pick up the phone every once in a while and talk to a friend instead of typing them a message. We need to go out with a group to the movies sometimes, instead of always discussing it in a thread. Most of all, we need to reach out and really connect with someone who is hurting in person. As much as a card or email can make someones day, a hug or a listening ear can do wonders.

Just my two cents.