The Digital Divide

I realized this morning how many of the things I desperately want and don't have (back to the subject of photographs again) have to do with the fact that I am basically on the wrong side of the digital divide.  Basically now I see two digital divides.  There is of course the big one (which I am on the right side of), which is "do you own a computer or other device that enables you to use email and the Internet" or even "do you regularly have access to such a device by walking to a library".  And this is not nothing.  My partner and several of her friends either don't know how to use email or the Internet, or only use it at the library, therefore email is not their primary mode of communication.  But then there's a new one that involves do you or don't you own or know how to use all kinds of (prohibitively expensive) gadgets that you don't need to earn a living (or at least I don't) or to stay in touch with friends or conduct simple business, but that make life "fun".

For example I am thinking again of the younger people on Facebook who are constantly posting pictures of themselves.  When I mentioned something about this a woman responded thinking I had said I wanted to meet a professional photographer who would take head shots.  But that is not what I meant at all.  I just meant having a friend with a smart phone who was (and these are my exact words) "part of the document your life as you go" culture.  For starters, very few of my friends have smart phones.  Some of them only just got a no frills cell phone last year!!  I have had a cell phone for almost 10 years.  I got it when pay phones were no longer readily available and basically I use it either in lieu of pay phone (to make calls when I am out), so that people can reach me when I'm out, or to make "long distance" calls, which are prohibitively expensive from the land line.  I keep the land line because the cell phone reception in my tiny apartment (which is as deprived of air as a subway station, practically) is very spotty.  I plan to replace it with the simplest, least expensive iphone when it conks out, but not before.  I consider that an unnecessary luxury, as I'm living on less than half of what I made when I was working full time.  If I want to blow money, I'll blow it on producing a concert.

Yes, I can also use it as a camera, but it is not a very good one.

I also have a digital camera, which my partner bought me probably five or six years ago.  To date, any time I have wanted pictures developed I have taken the little thingummy (which usage dates me terribly!) to a camera store and asked them to make prints.

Once a friend did come over and help me install the software, but it turns out it does not interface with Windows 7, which is what I use on this laptop.  Probably I could figure out how to download a new "driver' (I did this with my printer - something I need for work) but with all I have to do this is way down my list of priorities.

Interestingly, photography used to be a hobby of mine, but my interest in it diminished greatly when the onus devolved upon me to handle the technical end of things.  Previously, all I had to do was have a good eye for choosing a subject and framing a picture and drop off the "roll of film" somewhere.  Other people did the rest.

And of course my friends do not have digital cameras or phones that they use as cameras either.  One friend took a picture of me taking a bow after my performance as Dalila and it took her two years to figure out how to "get the picture out of the camera and mail me a print!!"  And the friends I have with smart phones don't take pictures on a daily basis - only if they are traveling or visiting their grandchildren.  As I said on Facebook, if I went out to lunch with one of them and asked her to snap a photo because I was wearing a drop dead sexy looking top, she would think I was crazy.  In fact I only got the new profile picture that I use  here because a friend from out of state (who had a digital camera with her) came for a visit and I begged her to let me "take five" to go in my tiny dressing area and put on my favorite sexy red lace top.  (And this woman actually knew how to dump the picture into her computer and email it to me.  But then she at least is under 50, if not technically part of the "younger crowd" for whom "snap and document" is as natural as breathing.)

Also, one thing that surfaced in my Artist's Way morning pages (not to mention my therapy sessions) is that I both need to work more hours to make more money and get out of the house more to see more people.  The obvious answer, of course, is to take my laptop into a Starbucks or some such place but I would be terrified to carry my livelihood around with me unnecessarily, not to mention that I don't know what to do with the doodat (another great technical term) that would make the laptop wifi ready.

I think what I really need in my life are some young friends (under 40) who are the kind of close friends who will do a quickie favor for you at your house just in the natural course of events, but of course I'm 62 so my friends are all my age more or less or older, because my partner is 78, and most of them started out as her friends.  I have no family.  And there aren't even really any neighbors in that demographic either because a rent regulated building is by definition a NORC aka "Naturally Occurring Retirement Community".

I wish I could find a way to hold auditions for a "nephew".