The Stack and the Net

Los Angeles, California

I was watching a program recently where, before sitting down to a meal at their home, the host collected everyone's cell phones. I was reminded that I once heard someone interviewed on Fresh Air who was promoting an unplugged weekend. At the time, several years back, that appealed to me. But now, it just seems impossible! I now even need my phone to unlock and start my car! While I ponder about overusing my phone, I am gratified that I stave off impatience by playing pool on my phone, when I am, for example, waiting in line at the bank. But my phone usage has begun to usurp time that I would normally spend reading books at night, or catching up on the last month of The New Yorker magazines that I seem to be perpetually chasing.

Texting sometimes stands in for telephone conversations, which is both good and bad. Good in its expediency; but bad in its lack of face-to-face, or at least voice-to-voice, connection. Thankfully, it hasn't replaced the phone conversations that I have with my cousin and my closest friends, and, of course, Joel. But for some of the friends with whom I am in intermittant contact, texting often suffices, and that's okay.

Christopher once mentioned the stack, where, during business lunches, everyone stacks their cellphones in the middle of the table. The first one who reaches for their phone has to pay for the meal. I once proposed a similar plan with friends who seem to be vilely steeped in celebrity culture: The first one who mentions 'the k-word' pays for the meal. The k-word being Kardashian (Kardashian clearly up there with Lord Voldemort as a name which should not be spoken aloud ever). I suspect they were not amused. Can you imagine?

The cell phone thing has apparently replaced the personal computer thing which replaced the television thing. Think of the changes that have occurred in interpersonal relationships since people have become distracted by screens. I grew up in the sixties, and have no memory of living in a home without televisions. There was always a television set in each of our bedrooms, though not in my parents' bedroom nor anywhere else in the house. Watching television together was not a family activity, as both my parents looked on TV-watching as something that was done by people who did not read books. However, my grandfather worked for Barker Brothers department store in downtown Los Angeles, and they retailed television sets. So, our family always had an abundance of new TVs, even though my parents never watched except when there was a major news event or NASA launch (Dad was an aerospace engineer whose firm worked on instruments in those rockets). We had our skating lessons and other activities, including Girl Scouts, after school. At night, we did our homework and practiced piano during the week. If we were at home on the weekends, we played games while listening to albums on the stereo system that my father had built. Engineer that he was, he had put together a receiver, a metal tray of tubes and wires, connected to a turntable. When my parents joined us, we played Tripoly and other card games. I was the youngest in my family, and always trying to get the rest of them to play board games with me. I think I got them to play Clue and Monopoly a couple of times, but we got back to Tripoly pretty quickly.

I'm not the first person to observe that technology is wreaking havoc on our relationship to others. On this planet, normal humans need to have a connection with the people in their lives. At the worst of times, three years ago, my therapist and I discussed the idea of bringing my female friends together in a sort of loose support group. When I floated this idea out to two of them, one immediately demurred, saying she wasn't interested in talking about, nor listening to others' problems. Fair enough. So, the Frister Fridays became social, which was fine. Friendships became stronger through these monthly get togethers, which clearly separated the women from the girls.

Recently, my friend Cathy, who is also my pilates trainer and acupuncture practitioner, was telling me about a workshop she attended in Washington state. We were having lunch at a little restaurant in Westwood called Fundamental. After she described one of the exercises in visualization which was called The Net, I had an epiphany. That was a realization of what my friends and I are providing for each other. The net Cathy described is a metaphor where strength comes from being interwoven, which allows it to support, even to gently rock, as in a hammock. How important is that? In my own net, I am, literally, trusting these women with my life as I have given them this power through my Living Trust. But they are also available, and emotionally available, in so many other ways. As I have written before, Joel is my rock. But these women are my safety net.

Whether they know it or not, everyone needs The Net in their lives. If you don't get this, step away from this blog and go watch a few Sex and the City episodes. Or, The Golden Girls, or I Love Lucy. Remember how many times Ethel was side-by-side with Lucy in all of her zany experiences and schemes? If you utilize your friends for socializing alone, you are missing out on what it feels like to have people in your life who have your back, whom you can call at any time, and with whom you balance all of that by also having a lot of shared fun: travel, and shopping, and concerts, and special dinners together. The best of two worlds. And the best part of all of it? They are always only a text away...

And again, thanks for reading my blog!