I'm talking about cell phones. What IS it with our culture now to where everybody has to be so connected? What's wrong with being quiet and being ALONE?
And what is WITH these ridiculous earpieces that I see so many people wearing? Do they really think they're so important that they must be reached at all times? Do they enjoy being so accessible?
And why is it suddenly accepted social behavior to ignore everyone around you to blab away on the phone? You know what REALLY gets me? It's these people who go shopping, talking loudly the whole time as they walk around, then go to check out and are so preoccupied with themselves and their conversation that they don't even treat the cashier as a person. No acknowledgement whatsoever that they are face-to-face with a breathing human being.
I used to see this all the time at Wal-Mart or the grocery store. Now it happens to me at the bookstore, and I refuse to wait on someone who's on the phone and won't acknowledge me. I either walk off or simply stand there and give them the death stare until they bother to look up. Then I hit them with twenty questions to MAKE them talk to me.
Don and I were at Wal-Mart today, sitting on a bench looking at the pictures we just picked up, and I noticed this attractive young woman, probably in her early 30's. She had a boy about a year old who was sitting in her shopping cart, and he was squirming and babbling away to her. She was talking on her cell phone, meandering through the shoe department and completely ignoring the boy in the cart. About 5 minutes later, I hear, "Emerson? Emerson! Where are you?!" Here she comes, totally panicked, pacing through the store looking for her OTHER son (undoubtedly the small boy of about 4 years who I noticed walking alone a few minutes earlier). Her frantic yelling continued for several more minutes until she finally found him. I wonder if it ever clicked in her mind that she should quit chatting and start parenting her kids.
Cell phones are great, usually. I have one. It's useful in an emergency or if you're grocery shopping for an unfamiliar ingredient and have to call Mom. But there is a time and a place to use them. "Anytime" and "anywhere" are not appropriate.
I'd like to ask God about His opinion on this. I wonder if he would point me here to Colossians 4:5-6a:
"Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace..."
