Tuesday, September 5, 2017

So near, yet so far

Article for Bethlehem Matrimonial - Sep 2017

I still remember the letter box on our gate back home, as one of the most cherished sights during my school days. The walk to the box to find if there was a letter in it was always been filled with mixed emotions. It was a heart wrenching feeling to see an empty letter box. On the other hand, the feeling was unexplainable when the box was not empty and the happiness multiplied if there were letters from dear ones.

Many of the letters may have been posted weeks before with updates about events that happened even months back. All these may probably sound strange today to a new generation of kids who may find it difficult to relate to the depth of emotions attached to a piece of paper found or missing in a metal box filled with details of something that happened sometime in the past!

Years went by and we now have technology that enables us to know and see events as and when they unfold. Anything less than a live update is considered stale news these days. News channels and social media thrive on ‘breaking news’ or latest updates. A swipe to refresh the updates on an app is all what is required to see the most recent post. It is quite interesting to observe that the emotions related to seeing or not seeing a letter in a letter box can be related to an update found or missing on a social media app.

These apps today allow you to reach out to your dear ones as you wish and no news will have to wait for days or months to be shared with people whom you care. Any event can now be broadcasted live using these apps. If not a live streaming, we at least sent quick updates in the form of pictures or videos as soon as it happens. An update screams itself on our phones in the form of an alert which when selected unveils the latest news from the sender.

For people like me, who have seen the best of both worlds, old and new, somehow get this feeling at times that an update I’ve received as an ‘inland letter’ or an ‘airmail’ carried more love and warmth than the updates through the present day social media. Even when the former gave me an update about something that happened in a dear one’s life sometime in the distant past I distinctly remember the genuine love and warmth I experienced reading that as against the most recent update through one of the modern day apps.

Though it is practically not easy to replicate that beautiful experience from the past, my wife and I decided to do something similar this time during the summer vacation. Fortunately we got a few days extra to plan and execute the idea as well. We decided to take some time from our vacation days and visit our dear ones at their homes and spend some quality time with them. It will be an understatement if I say, the feeling of love we experienced was nothing compared to the hundreds of messages exchanged over WhatsApp or Facebook with the same people!

It was a reiteration that human beings are designed as social animals. For us, meeting and spending time with people gives us the much needed motivation to take our life forward. There are quite a few things we learn by interacting with similar social beings around us. I strongly believe that all these and many more may not be achievable through the modern day apps though we have given them a pet name ‘social media’!

If you’ve been one like me where you think social media indeed is helping you being in touch, try meeting these people in real life. Spend a few minutes with them. You’ll be surprised to see the difference these interactions bring in your life as well as theirs! These are the good things our previous generation tried teaching us but have slowly gone into the oblivion as we’re living in those times when people are digitally so near yet emotionally so far apart!

May you realize this fact sooner than later and may you be able to plan your next visit to your dear ones at the earliest to experience the bliss of being social in its true sense.


God bless!

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