Forget It

I forgot my son’s birthday. Ok, that sounds worse than it really is. Let me explain. First of all, it was the birthday of the youngest that I forgot. We have a lot of kids, they all kind of look the same, so cut me some slack. Second, I didn’t miss his birthday (he actually hasn't had one yet), I just forgot when it would be.

However, this is surprising for me since I’m usually the one who remembers dates. I’m not old enough to be losing my memory from age, but I’m the perfect age to be losing brain memory to computers. That’s right: I blame technology.

After being exposed to a word processor I lost the ability to spell. After being exposed to GPS I lost the ability to navigate. After being exposed to sunlight for two hours you should discard mayonnaise. I know that has nothing to do with what I was talking about, but I have to keep the attention of the millennials and they like this sort of thing.

Anyway, as I was saying, being introduced to new technology regularly makes me more efficient (at least in the way businesses define efficiency) but it's bankrupting my brain’s store of rudimentary abilities. I outsource dates to calendars and when I try to recall them on my own I’m starting to come up empty.

It really makes me wonder how my kids are going to experience technology. To be sure, they already are, even if it’s only by observing how adults are constantly absorbed in their phones no matter where they are. They must think phones are magic boxes of ethereal delight. And the kids probably do too.

But back to birthdays. In defense of technology, or at least in an attempt not to make it complicit in the birthday forgetting, I should point out I’m not big on birthdays. If my memory was a row of books organized by priority, people’s birthdays would be next to books about dry to liquid conversion rates.

Even so, technology can't be entirely let off the hook. It certainly has good uses, but it’s not a coincidence that high school students can’t write a proper sentence and texting (perhaps while driving) is at an all-time high. Whether it’s my memory or a majority of children's writing skills this stuff does have impacts

Despite my laments, I’m (mostly) not a luddite. I just hope to encourage and establish basic skills (reading, writing, thinking) in the kiddos, before introducing whatever new technologies are out there.

I think we’ll wait until the oldest is at least 10. Whenever that is.