I've made a few new acquaintences in real life lately. Just this Sunday, I told one of them that I frequently miss out on activities because some communication goes out only via the internet, and so if it's last minute planning, I don't get it. I don't have internet at home.
There are many reasons for this. It helps me completely disconnect from the in silico world and reconnect with actual friends in person and with the earth in my back yard or in Red Rock NCA. It helps me control how I use my time. A friend of mine, who owns a marketing firm, told me a few weeks back that most internet activity occurs between the hours of 10AM and 2PM. The internet sucks people in. It helps me control what gets into my house. See, when you're at home, where nobody sees you, you think nothing of doing things that you wouldn't do in public...like math. It doesn't have to be something nefarious or evil, just that I wouldn't manage an online dating profile from work or post malicious comments about coworkers or the job there (assuming I had them to say), and since I cannot at home, they go unsaid and I calm down. I also don't impulse buy or buy comfort items. If I want something, I have to go to the store, and I frequently don't want Rocky Road badly enough to walk the mile to Smiths to buy it.
Years ago, I got some really good advice from Pat Morita in The Karate Kid. "Best way avoid fight, not be there." There is also a poem, whose origin yet eludes me, that says, "All the water in the world, no matter how it tried, could never sink the smallest ship unless it got inside. All the evil in the world, the blackest kind of sin, cannot hurt us the least bit unless we let it in." So, I choose not to have to fight with cable or the internet or those nefarious forces that roam it in search of easy prey. The dirty back alleys of yesteryear are now something we carry with us into every refuge and sanctuary. We carry our iPhones in our pockets and allow both bad people and good people to contact us at their leisure. You no longer have to seek trouble and go there; it can find you anywhere and at any time. Now they come to you, even when you do things you believe to be innocuous. It is for me a fortification.
I really like to disconnect. People forget that cell phones are a privilege, and instant gratification is the business of fast food companies, not mine. They expect me to answer because I can, even if I am at work, asleep, or in an important meeting. Last night, I was paying bills by phone. It is not that I don't care or am involved in something bad, it is that I am already involved in something that deserves my attention because it was there before you came.
Not having internet allows me to control better that to which I give my attention. Sometimes it's inconvenient, but I don't use it as a crutch. Last week, I read three books cover to cover, and I really rather enjoyed it. I took my dog for a walk three nights. I even met some new folks. I get out and enjoy the world, and I rather like that. Sometimes I think we have too many options in how to employ our time. CS Lewis wrote that it does not have to be something wicked that destroys a man. "Adultery is no better than cards if cards will do the trick...the safest road to hell is the gradual one - the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts." In short, he can win our souls by simply wasting our time.
Almost exactly a year ago, someone I once knew well told me this, which inspired me:
I've always hated social networking sites. I've always hated the internet in general. It connects me to the virtual world, but disconnects me from reality. I'm picking up more books, going on walks that will be full of thought, writing incessantly, and spending time with actual people. I will not allow the internet to consume me like it does so many others. I've made up my mind, and this will be au revoir.
So she since returned to the internet; big deal. I'm not sure you can survive or thrive in a world dominated by quick connections without the internet, but the point I have adopted is this: I will not allow the internet to consume me. Playing video games, surfing, tweeting, using facebook, etc., are fine as long as the games are not playing you. My object is to recover and retain a modicum of self control and trade the jejune and ruderal for things of eternal consequence.
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