Look what computers did to my family
Here I stand, resolute, but alone,
struggling to cling to the last vestiges
of face to face family life.
Saturday tea time tables and shared viewing.
Those tattered curtains of distant memories
appear unsullied when illuminated,
through dyed pink lenses.
Images of a life gone by.
Down the shallow scree they fall,
eager for a steeper incline
leading to the valley floor.
A space, a place,
where separate lives are led
without ever leaving their rooms.
These shifting patterns of modernity,
a kaleidoscope of otherworldly virtuality,
evolve into self-absorbed retreats,
isolation, from human touch.
I wrote this one evening (probably a Saturday night) while we were all watching TV, or at least, we were all in the same room, but my sons and husband were all on different ‘machines’ (for want of a better word) and doing their own thing, and I felt so incredibly alone. It struck me that although technology allows us to communicate so much more than we had previously done, it actually stops us communicating face to face, and we become more isolated, not less, as a result of it. I could go on, but I will leave it there for now. I’m not a luddite, heaven knows I use technology and keep up to date with it, I spent many years researching about it, and using it, but I only ever see it as a tool for work. This is where I differ from my family, and many of my friends, who use it for leisure. Me? I’d rather pick up a phone than text, and meet for coffee rather than online, and my private life is just that, it’s not for Twitter, Facebook or any other social media. Even when I skype, I do so with coffee!
PUBLISHED First draft October 2008 then reworked December 2022 and published in Fulcrum Review in 2025 and also as part of an article in the ‘Advancing Education Journal’
Spring 2025