Today I was sitting at my usual spot for lunch and unlike other days I was sitting alone, as my lunchtime friends were out and about. I've been reading this book called Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, I highly recommend it, very moving and charming story based on a boy who lost his father in 9/11. As I sat reading this book I was reminded about the moment when I first heard about 9/11 and where I was (probably everyone does) and I remember how not until I saw what happened did it truly affect me. It was words coming out of someone's mouth and having never been to New York and not knowing what the twin towers were, it didn't become fully realized until I was at home watching the news.
But that is not what this memory is about, it just played a part in it and maybe I will revisit that memory later, (it's quite blurry and linked to a memory of feeling rather than experiencing). So back from the tangent, thinking about that moment made me think of other moments in time that were epic in nature, yet unrealized at the time.
This memory could be when I was in grade 8, maybe grade 9. My social studies teacher Mr. Aikins was a bear like man with a salt and pepper beard and the same growly nature. He was strict, and I remember little bits and pieces of his classes but not much else. One day during class we were sitting and writing on the Amazon Rainforest (I think), and Mr. Aikins started talking about this new thing happening with computers. He told us that soon we would be able to access all kinds of information around the world by using a computer. He spoke of libraries being able to share information with other libraries and that we wouldn't have to take books out. Now to a class full of pre-pubescent teens it really didn't seem that interesting. Information from libraries? what? who cares about research this really isn't going to affect us, we barely do research as it is. All this stuff on the rainforest I made up after watching the movie he showed us. what about this awesome cd-rom encyclopedia shouldn't that be enough? I don't know seems like the computer is a nerd's paradise, i'm out.
It was before the future but also in the midst of it. The internet was useless to me at first, waiting for the dial up then one of my many siblings picking up the phone and all that time waiting wasted. It was a completely revolutionary idea, and not until dial-up ended and I saw the use of research and knowledge became very valuable and how convenient everything became that I now know I can never go back to a life before it. Have a question? answered! Need something but have no idea where to get it? Found it, it will only cost 40 dollars in shipping but still it exists! Our lives are shared online, we meet our future husbands and wives online. The uses of the world wide web can only be re-created over and over to mold it to our needs, people's voices can be heard across the globe, and we can find the weirdest of weird things, and the small lives we live in real life can be made global. This world wide web was not just limited to libraries and encyclopedias, he really downplayed the entirety of it all, but then maybe no one really knew the true outcome of this small invention, and how it would affect so many people.
I recently helped a young Somali man radiowiilwaal.com create you tube posts of his comedy routines, this simple act he hopes will get him global recognition, and that it will reach a Somali audience from his new home in Canada. His life will forever be changed if it takes off, and a promising career in making people laugh in the midst of turmoil can be had. Even now I write this post hoping one day someone will read it and enjoy it, and even if that day never comes its still out there in the world taking up space on the information highway.
The question remains was my imagination of the www small or was it focused elsewhere just unrealized at the time?
I remember the first email I ever sent. It blew my mind that I could write to someone (who I was talking on the phone with) and they recieved it straight away. Whoa! It made talking about boys and celebrities that much better!
ReplyDeleteI also remember a time when all I used a computer for was playing Mixed Up Mother Goose and writing my club's newspaper. I remember that to access programs you had to type in a DOS code. And if you forgot a / or . you couldn't find your program.
What a long way we've come, I don't know what I would do without a computer and the internet. But at the same time sometimes I worry about home much time I spend on it. At work, at home everywhere. Sometimes I just miss silence and a good book.
Thanks for sharing your story!