Device and Conquer

         “In my day we had two tin cans and a string,” Reuben, 83, said. We were discussing electronic devices for children.

         “I tried those,” I said, “but the service was always down.”

         Reuben and I met at the local Coffee Bean and bonded over my dog, Joey. He’s there every day and I’d seen him either snoozing in the corner or talking with other old guys. One day, I tied Joey up to a meter and went inside to order my double cappuccino. He started to bark. Came outside to find Reuben feeding him something he'd dug out of his pocket: cookies and chips. Joey was captivated.

         We three sat on chairs outside and got to know each other. Reuben is from Romania. He’s been here 48 years and has two adult children living in Calabasas, a 45-minute drive which he can no longer do. His daughter brings the grandchildren over, which used to delight him. They'd play games, run around the yard. Now 9 and 11, they're only interested in their smartphones and don't interact with him.      

         I see very young children with these phones and even toddlers being pushed in their strollers with a smartphone or an iPad attached for their viewing pleasure. This is not a recent development. Thirty years ago I was horrified when a pediatrician friend hooked up a video player in her minivan for a road trip with her two kids. Two years later you could buy a car with its own screen. No "are we there yet?" for those parents. During that same period, I bought Suspense radio shows on cassette and played the stories on a drive to Utah with my sons. They had to use their imagination to visualize the scenes. When I pulled over for gas, they asked me to keep playing the tape.

         I’ve read complaints dating back 60 years about the corrupting influence of watching too much TV. True, our black & white TV was a babysitter of sorts. But we only had three channels in Santa Fe and at least two of them stopped broadcasting by 10:30 p.m. My mom worked nights and I waited up for her. I was forced to pick up a book and read.

         Posted an abbreviated version of this piece on Facebook for discussion and got a variety of responses. Here are three of the best:

“We have two grandkids the same ages. If I don't play their video games or can talk them into going for a bike ride, I am just an old adult, Grandpa, who they have a hard time relating to. The question that I ask is not, "When is introducing the 21st century tools too early?" Now I ask, "How can I interact with them and have us all engaged?” Mushroom Montoya.

“This how we end up with a ‘media mogul’ as president!” Tom Pa

“It's the future get used to it. Human/machine integration will be commonplace.” Carlos Encinas

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The Icing Twins

The old man’s hooded eyes focused on the photo of two teenaged girls smashing their faces into slices of birthday cake. He tapped the picture and said, “Snuck up on them for this one, but they heard me coming. Yep, last picture of the girls we have.”

The reporter glanced at the picture. “That’s the picture the FBI used?”

The old man sighed. “Lotta good it did them. Change their hair color. Use a different color of icing and all youse got is a headline—”

“The Icing Twins Strike Again!” the reporter said in the exaggerated tones of an anchorman announcing late-breaking news.

“Most successful bank robbers ever!" The old man raised his chin, proud and defiant. "Never been caught. Never heard from them once they began their life of crime.” He looked down at the picture again. His hand trembled. “My granddaughter broke her mother’s heart.”

The reporter consulted his notes. “Debbie and Ellie swore they were twins even though they had different parents?”

“They had a connection. It ran between them strong. You ever seen a dog and an electric fence?” He didn’t wait for the reporter to answer. “It was like that. A line of electricity between them that warned everyone away, like they might get shocked if they got too close. We figured it was just teenage lesbo stuff.”

“Yes, well, according to reports Debbie and Ellie finished each other’s sentences, had the same gestures and facial tics and made the same impulsive decisions.”

“They got tired of people saying, ‘But you don’t look anything alike.’ It made ‘em angry. ‘Nobody sees us,’ our Ellie said. It was then they decided to never have their pictures taken again."

“Why do you think they started their life of crime?”

“If I knew that, mister, I wouldn’t be sittin’ here in my pajamas talkin’ to you. Oh sure, maybe we shoulda told Ellie she was adopted, but how was we to know Debbie was adopted, too?” The old man set the picture down and twisted his arthritic hands together, agitated. “What are the chances of them endin’ up in the same neighborhood? Plenty of folks is adopted and they don’t rob banks!”

“Hmm, do you think Ellie and Debbie, um, became lovers?”

The old man struggled to his feet. “What kind of a sick sumbitch are you? That’d be incest!”

He showed the reporter to the door and went over to the mantle to raise a picture he’d lowered just before the man arrived. He smiled down at the latest photo of Debbie and Ellie. A new one arrived on their birthday every year. This one showed the sisters with their three children. All five of them had their faces smashed down in birthday cake.

Flash written in response to the photo above.