I’m standing on the precipice, looking at the bridge stretched out in front of me. On this side of the land, the bridge starts as wood, and gradually changes color and substance as it becomes steel farther away. On the other side of the mile deep drop-off the bridge is modern, stylish, and brand new. And so is the land over there. Electronic grass, microchip mud, and all manner of flashing lights.
Where am I? I’m here, kicking off this blog page, getting advice from my friend about web 2.0, really enjoying updating stuff on Facebook, looking towards setting up sermons on YouTube. I’m a 33 year old man realizing I’m about to cross over into the “fully-plugged-in-mode” and wondering if I should do it. Heck, I’m even thinking about getting an iPhone next spring when my current cell contract runs out.
Now you may be thinking “Aaron, what are you talking about? We’re all in the ‘plugged-in’ age!” Cell phones and laptops (I have both), email accounts and CD players (of course). But this mode I’m talking about is a different way of using the web, of investing alot of time and energy into communicating and connecting over the dubya-dubya-dot. Frequent blog updates, a real ministry outlet online, trying to develop a big audience out there (out there – where you’re reading this right now). And then keeping up with it all on a shiny new iPhone (“Phones are for talking!” I insisted barely two years ago). Plugged in. Really putting my hands onto this virtual place and trying to make something substantial.
There’s a side of me (remember, I am 33) that just doesn’t trust it all. It says “Okay, fine, you can have your Hotmail account and get on CNN to check the news, but that’s IT! Get in the web, get out, but don’t trust that place! Don’t set up shop there!” I grew up in that in-between period. Didn’t have this stuff as a kid. Back then my laptop had Triple Shake Memory (Etch-a-Sketch).
The Emily Bronte novel (don’t laugh) lying on the window seat across from my bed, that book which is made of paper which came from trees, compels me not to cross that bridge. So does “The Lord of the Flies” two books up. All paper and dried black ink, all the product of a different paradigm, a different age.
So what do you think? Should I go for it? Digitally immerse myself at the risk of ending up looking a Anime kid with the complexion of tuna fish because he’s always inside on the computer? What if I develop all the charm of Bill Gates? Have you SEEN him in an interview?
