This is not going to be a scholarly or even well-researched post. You should know that at the outset.

But if you are middle-aged, like me, you have a particular relationship to the digital age that I believe is worth exploring.

We all saw the dancing baby. And we were like, “WHAT HOW IS THIS MADNESS POSSIBLE THIS IS CRAZY”, as we crowded around our dad’s huge computer (well, if you lived at my house) and then he shooed us away to go do something non technology related. Like watch TV.

But now, well, we’re kind of awesome at it. We went from a Brother typewriter where you could finally see what you were typing and correct it (again, if you’re me), to auto-correct that makes odd choices but still, for the most part, helps us make fewer errors (although sometimes seems inebriated). And guess what? We can now use twitter with zero typos because you can edit what you type there! (hahaha just kidding. No. You can’t.)

Just today I went to sign up for a new service to create a fun email signature for my gmail account only to find out I already have an account with them! And evidently have since 2012. I don’t remember doing that. I don’t remember the company. It’s just a blank.

But I believe this is to be expected.

After all, we’ve had user names and passwords since the early 1990’s – which, I’m not sure you realize, was almost 30 years ago. That’s a HUGE MASSIVE DIGITAL BLUEPRINT and it not only seems weird, it’s terrifying.

We went from our parents being terrified of debit cards ushering in the anti-Christ (again, perhaps just me) to now I pretty much give the last 4 digits of my social to anyone that asks because otherwise you won’t be able to change your cable bill. Literally just happened this morning.

Meeting people on the internet used to be completely forbidden and terrifying.

And just last week I literally made plans to meet a girl in Paris that I met on twitter.

Maybe I’m not the best or the smartest when it comes to technology. But then again . . oh wait, there’s no but to that. Just the first part.

So my point? I’m not sure I have one. Mostly because all the technology I use has given me the attention span of a gnat. Where was I? Hang on . . I guess I just want to put it out there that we know more than anybody about all this technology stuff because we’ve been there since the beginning. We are the HISTORIANS OF THE INTERNET. We used to PAY for music instead of stream it, we had MySpace accounts (OK, I didn’t but somebody must have) and we started using Facebook when it was like 4 people and 3 of them were your in-laws.

And now we have blogs, and YouTube channels, and we tweet and we snap chat and face time and find our  iphones. A lot. We find our iphones A WHOLE LOT.

So if you used to have to go to Costco Photo to get your pictures developed, and now you’re on insta lIKE A BOSS I just want to say I’m really proud of you. That’s a lot to do in 30 years.

The End