Like Flipping a Switch
I am going to share two brief scenarios, two states of being. I can't recall how suddenly I transitioned from the former to the latter. It may have been slower than I remember. In my mind, it feels instantaneous--like flipping a switch.
Life Before 1993
Throughout my youth, I remember engaging with other children on a constant basis. We moved to another nearby town when I was in elementary school, but in both communities we spent time most days playing with other kids in our neighborhood. Indoor and outdoor games. Weeks and months lost to imagination as we crawled through brambles and ran narrow dirt paths through the forests adjacent to our home. Other friends to play with at recess when we were in school. There were also youth activities at church, which we were compelled to attend three times each week.
Yes, we also had quieter days at home, but there is almost always someone to interact with when you have siblings.
Over time, the groups morphed, the players changed, but there were always others around and we were always into something. I have never enjoyed athletics other than the occasional tennis match, but became involved in the arts in middle school. I joined the band and art club. By high school, I had taken an interest in drama and performed in the school musical. We were also still active in the church. At the time of graduation, I was routinely running with four different friend groups: my close circle of chums, the band kids, the church youth group, and my future wife and her friends.
When I left for college, there were obviously shifts. Relationships were primarily the result of proximity. I saw much less of my close circle, my future wife's friends, and rarely saw the band and church acquaintances at all. New circles developed, of course: the other students in my major course of study, friends I made while living in the dormitory, friends I made while serving as a resident assistant, and new friends of my future wife. Dozens of people, an even wider circle than high school.
All of this to say that I was surrounded by people whenever I had the urge. There were always gatherings and outings to attend if I chose: card games, concerts, nights at the bar, date nights, house parties, quiet conversations in dorm rooms, and so on. I was physically alone only when I wanted to be. I can't remember ever being bored.
Life After 1993
I was a resident assistant in a college campus dormitory in 1993 when I borrowed (with my boss’ permission) the unused modem from our shared office and first discovered a local BBS. I had been a computer enthusiast since the early ‘80s, but going online changed everything.
I purchased my first home computer in 1983 or '84 and paired it with a small black and white CRT television I found on sale. I thought these new machines were the bee's knees, and taught myself to program games and utilities. I almost immediately tired of retyping code, so I saved up for a cassette drive and later a 5 1/4" floppy disk drive. I would spend a fair number of Saturday afternoons on my computer, but technology was not an obsession for me. In fact, I didn't use a computer much at all during college until I purchased a Mac through a campus program in 1993.
With my new computer and the aforementioned modem, I got lost in an online universe. The Internet existed, of course, but most of us had no idea and the web was in its infancy. Local BBSs--and later major endeavors like CompuServe and AOL--was where you could find the digital party. I can't begin to estimate the number of late nights spent chatting over the modem, all with people I had never and would never meet in real life. Discussions about mutual interests, politics, philosophy, and of course, sex. It was a Brave New World.
I graduated college and slowly lost touch with those circles of friends. My wife and I moved away for graduate school, and all my other prior relationships dissolved. It was painful for me to lose them. I intentionally chose not to make new friends in graduate school, as I viewed my time there as strictly temporary. I had my wife, friendly but professional relationships with those at school, fleeting interactions with people who had previously been my entire world, and increasing time spent with a machine--captured by a digital universe filled with transient, faceless strangers. In what seems like no time at all, it was mostly me and a glowing screen.
Based on what I see in the world today, I doubt I am the only one.
Stasis
My personal life has generally been the same since then. After my divorce, I dated a woman seriously for five years, three of those were long distance. I've casually dated others, slept with far too many women to remember. But for the past 20 years, I have not allowed myself to develop strong emotional ties with any of them. I consider a few of them to be acquaintances, fewer still friends. I believe perhaps ten of my social media connections are current or former lovers.
Of course, I regularly interacted with thousands of people in my daily work over a 30-year career, both colleagues and our clientele. I consider some of them to be friends. But friendship has never looked as it did before 1993. Now retired, I make a conscious effort to schedule dinner with someone at least once every few weeks. There are no card games, no concerts, no date nights or parties, no routine conversations about politics, philosophy, sex, or anything else. I'm often bored, passively consuming media through a device.
The Why
With a stressful and time-consuming career behind me and more time on my hands, I'm reflecting more on the possible explanations.
It could be this is the way things are supposed to go. Isn't it our societal expectation to pair up and gradually lose connection with others in favor of the family unit? That's the message we get from media: two parents and 2.5 children is supposed to be "the norm," at least according to the executive producers. However, the media doesn't offer productive thoughts on what you're supposed to do if you're one of the increasing number of single people. Other than adopt a bunch of cats, slip in the tub, and die of loneliness and a broken hip. Hardy helpful.
And what about that stressful and time-consuming career I mentioned? Society again levels expectations about such things, and 65-hour work weeks don't allow much room for nurturing relationships. Is our post-capitalist economy to blame for the lack of intimate and meaningful interaction so many of us seem to experience?
An excuse I used for years was the pain of separation I mentioned upon graduating from college. That round of lost friendships took a powerful emotional toll on me. I've often told myself that's why I don't allow others to get close to me: to avoid a reoccurrence of that trauma. If you never allow yourself to become attached, there is no risk of future hurt. Of course, there is also a significant lack of reward to be gained through intimacy.
But the more I speculate on technology, the more I have to wonder. In 2025, you have to be living under a rock if you don't see the way corporations worth trillions of dollars are leveraging algorithms to drive engagement through division, separation, hate. They want us alone. They want us angry. Is it possible all of that was born in the development of the online world in, oh, around 1994?
I see it all around me. Entire generations that came after who can't interact with one another face to face. Who don't drive cars. Don't go out with friends or potential partners. Who, so far as I can tell, have no interest in getting laid. Technology just may have fucked our minds and by extension the rest of our lives, both the physical and metaphysical.
If that's the case, what are we supposed to do about it?
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