Digital Drop Out
Dear Editor: The disconnect is almost complete. I want to be a Digital Drop Out. I am one of over 800 Sitka residents who are 70-plus. That is, almost 9 (NINE!) percent of us Sitkans are probably feeling left out if we are not fluent and speedy in digital technology, digital terminology and digital gadgets.
No wonder so many commissions have vacancies. Little wonder some commissions are non-functional, and minutes don’t get recorded. Who reads them anyway? Not available in hard copy. Zapped into cyberspace, never to be retrieved, never a real part of the history of Sitka. Never filed nor mailed in hard copy. One relatively minor cosmic event and there it all goes. Whoosh!
I’ve had enough “go to the webpage” advice. Everything is NOT there. Nor is it “easy” to access. For example, I couldn’t find Sitka School District information on the city web page. And I couldn’t find information about Sitka’s school faculty on the school district web. I couldn’t find the Assembly agenda. Nor their minutes. And I’ve tried.
But I don’t like this growing obsession, indeed addiction, that I see in myself. I’m getting weird – in new ways. So I’m going to drop out and check how it feels.
Shall I do it cold turkey? And see how long I can last? Try it for a week? Or, a day? Big time? Or gentle? What will the withdrawal symptoms feel like? Will I drink more? Eat more? Sleep poorly? Get cranky from digital deprivation?
My sympathy to parents these days. How in the world are you going to civilize your kids if they are glued and wired to monitors and iPads? And teachers, our poor teachers. Recently I’ve learned that students are no longer required to learn cursive. It is “optional!!’’ Twenty-six letters individualized and stylized by the special personalities of each student is too difficult? Chinese and Japanese students learn thousands of extremely complex characters.
Oh, look! – New data in from the Department of Labor. Thirteen (13!) percent of Sitkans are 65 and older. Thank you, Sitkans, for courtesies for our growing vintage population. Please provide hard copy, mailed. City Assembly and commission minutes printed, filed and available. Phone numbers, spoken slowly – and even repeated. A cheerful phone call, especially if it interrupts someone’s 10th boring game of Solitaire. We Vintage Folk are not all digital crazy. Yet.
Am I ready to go cold turkey today? Not quite. Maybe Monday.
Nancy Yaw Davis, Sitka
