The Intense Life

On The Hudson
No LL

I was sitting in the Athens Public Library yesterday, surfing the net and ordering varnishes for this summer's coming makover of Tarwathie's cosmetics. I plunked down my computer on a table next to some of the library's public computers. At 1430, a nice teen aged girl, perhaps 13 years old, came in and started using the computer next to me.

I wasn't trying to spy on the girl but I got a big education on how some young folks live in today's fast track anyhow.

The first thing that alerted me was the sound of the furious bursts of keyboard strokes as she typed. It sounded like she was trying for a record in speed typing.

Then I noticed that she was wearing earphones plugged in to an IPOD. Of course; I should have expected that.

The girl logged in to some kind of online gaming site. I thought, "Aha! That's how she'll spend her time." Wrong. She played the game for only 5 minutes. Then it was on to her Yahoo mail page.. Then she was looking at a list of the top 50 songs. Then to myspace. Then to movie listings. Then to a big list of I don't know what.

I forgot to mention that while all that was occurring, her phone vibrated every 15 seconds. Even though she was sitting 12 inches away from a sign saying NO CELL PHONES, she answered each buzz. 9 of the 10 buzzes she got were text messages. I was amazed as she read each and composed a reply in seemingly 10 seconds or less. Her speed with that phone's keyboard was amazing. One of her calls was a plain old fashioned voice call. That one took her 30 seconds to dispose of.

Whoops, now she's gone and a second girl, this one about 10 yeard old sat down. She's checking her myspace account. Two minutes on that, and now she's at Yahoo mail.

Of course I already knew that teenagers do all these things. The surprising part to this ancient old man was how speedily and intensely they do it. They act like people overdosed on caffeine, or like I used to act at work when I was in danger of missing an important deadline. How terrible stressful their lives must be.

I hesitate to make judgments because I grew up in a different era and because there are three generations between me and these young girls. Nevertheless, if I were their parents I'd be worried to death about these young people burning themselves out at much too young an age. I
would also fear that they could lose their ability to concentrate and listen
at school or to just sit back and enjoy single-tasking while reading a book.

Am I wrong?