by Tommia Wright

When they say “No man’s an island,” it is amazing that in the ‘world-wide-webbed,’ and ‘overly-wired-world’ of ‘constant connectiveness’ that in this day and age, people don’t seem to see one another anymore. In walking down the street or through the multi-leveled malls, very few people talk with one another, discussing what’s new in their lives, or observing the day-to-day routines around them of shopkeepers preparing storefronts, of baristas, bakers and cooks preparing the orders to go, etc.

More than half of them walked by with an ‘ipad’ this or pda that, blackberry, bluetooth, smart-phone, laptop…In the cacophony of cellular conversation,  snippets of snapped retorts, shouted remarks, sarcastic suggestions, it makes one wonder if the same delivery would be made face-to-face. This isn’t to dismiss the benefits of technology or telephones and email or such – it does allow one to reach out to friends, family, associates further away. Yet is humanity destined to be ‘wired’ this way, in looking at pixels instead of pupils, in speaking technological shorthand instead of the basic, handshake?