My job required that I find people at wide range of profession to interview very quickly, so I contacted my new and old friends. My high profile consultant and scientist friends in San Francisco obliged to my request, even though one of them was back from London just for one night stop over before she had to go to Hawaii for a conference. My Georgia Tech graduate school professor friend obliged for an interview at her home, and found me a few other professional people to talk to.
And then north of Florida friends. I haven’t seen them in … 22 years! And the wonderful surprise was that they hadn’t changed at all as far as being bright eyed and bushy tailed were concerned. Yes, we all gained a few middle age pounds here and there, but they had beautiful faces. Same clear eyes, warm smiles. Only changes I saw were their 22 year-old son and the business they grew.
So what was the fascination? Two years ago in US, I was working with one of the top class American consulting firm. The workplace director at that time bemoaned that he was not able to get any satisfactory wireless system intact for their new office. Hotels, homes, nothing was really wireless except mobile phones. Then on this trip, all the places I visited had wireless. Just over a short two years, wireless has become an ordinary thing.
I definitely felt normal with my laptop, 3G mobile, iPod, using Skype. Progress!
But I also saw that how I changed the way I work around my laptop affected my thinking and work in bad way too. My focus level has gone down considerably. The minute I close my laptop, I can forget what I wrote in there. My journal has all been written in my laptop for the past 6 years, and I know for the past 3, 4 years, writing journal was no longer reflective or thought provoking. It was just a way to release tension.
Maybe I’ll go back to writing longhand, take my notes longhand. My friend in San Francisco told me about how he does it. Writing longhand is so liberating, because he can write anything. Then anything he wants to develop further, he would type into laptop. That would be my next progress.
FUJIKO SUDA 