It was a perfect early summer evening in Texas. Pleasant enough for jeans and a tank top and no mosquito invasion! A full moon was even rising over the Dallas horizon as the band was playing. What a scene.
Until the morons pulled out their phones.
We were seated on the lawn of a big outdoor venue, and there were a bunch of folks around us. When the headliner (Journey -- for their free plug) started playing, nearly every person in front of us held up their phone and hit "record". And those iPhone 6Pluses are damn large.
So I am trying to watch the band (and the band's screens also, as the stage was far away from our lawn seats), and all I can see is a zillion screens of the same image ahead of me. Most of the phone holders kept readjusting their devices and swapping between photo and video mode. It seemed insane to me that they spent $40 and up to worry about their phone containing proof they were indeed AT the concert. Some were posting the video on their social media platform of choice, which also is the LAST thing I will click on when scrolling through friends' posts. You think I (or likely, anyone) wants to watch your shitty video of Coldplay from the cheap seats? No, we don't. I am speaking for all of us here.
The sea of 3 inch screens was distracting, but mostly I thought, this is a great night and a great band, and you people are missing it! And all you will have is your fifty video clips on your phone that you will probably never watch more than once after you post for all of us to not click on. Silly people...
I find this to be the case at my kids' functions as well. Parents are jockeying to get the best position for capturing little Agamemnon accepting his "Principal's Award" for 1st grade (what is that, anyway? Your kid didn't bite anyone again this year?). Your kid knows you're there; you WITNESSED the miracle of his award-getting. Let's be happy in the moment, can we? Must we record it all for broadcast or later proof? Will we all suffer from memory loss and crave video and still photo documentation of our lives? Unlikely. And we are missing the first showing of the actual event. Like a LOT of the time.
Same with sporting events. I see parents setting up video equipment that Channel 5 would envy just to record the basketball game in case their angel gets a rebound. Or a bucket. And subsequently posting that uncut (please?) video for us all to see. When you look at a game through your two orbital organs, you can see a lot going on. Your eyes can dart to the bench to see if your kid's going in, watch the coach hitch his pants for the fifteenth time and check the scoreboard to note if the jack wagon 9th grader running it actually gave your team credit for that last free throw. It's a super cool thing, watching a game. With your phone in your pocket. You're actually PRESENT. And mindful of what's happening before you.
I know there will be protests to these blasphemous statements. Folks will tell me how they DO watch those videos and their kids LOVE watching themselves! "I could not BEAR it to not have a record of their first base hit/choir concert/spelling bee".
I challenge you to let your brain remember most of those memories. That's its job. And you can verbally recount the times to yourself or each other. "Remember when you hit that double against the Angels, and you puked when you got to second base??" Kid is probably glad that hit the cutting room floor.
As a minimalist, I savor experiences. It may be the smell of my lavender in late May, a Journey concert on a summer evening, or watching my boy give the welcome speech at his high school graduation. None of which I have on video. But I DO have the moment.
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