"In My Opinion . . ."
Dec. 30, 2000
I've sung the praises of the Internet for almost five years now, often in the face of disapproval from my peers. I hear other baby boomers claim that we are in the midst of a decline of civilization, and they love to place the blame on a) divorce/broken families, b) television/movies, c) rap/hip hop, or d) the Internet.
I deal with the problems of broken families since I teach school, but I can't necessarily trace a moral decline to them. I adore television and movies and have yet to find myself acting in an aberrant or psychotic manner because of their influence on me. My son listens incessantly to hip hop and he's still capable of speaking English, charming adults and maintaining healthy relationships with wonderful friends. And I will defend to my death the value of the Internet (well, perhaps that's slightly hyperbolic, but you get the drift).
Through various aspects of the Internet I've been reintroduced to friends from my high school days, people who may have quietly slipped out of my life, but whom I never really forgot. I suppose I'd be shocked to meet them face-to-face, since in my mind they all remain high school seniors. I keep thinking of myself as middle-aged, but I can't conjure up older versions of these former friends for some reason.