Digital Divide Revisited

There comes a day when you choose not to try something new, simply because you feel you might be too old for it.

I believe my reluctance to try something new saved my life when I was living solo in a tiny studio apartment and sought out a friend in hopes of moving into a bigger space, a shared house with, like, bedrooms.

During the move, I discovered my friend had taken up a new habit: ecstasy. (yes, it was the 90s) I knew that if I were to move in, I would quite likely end up taking X at some point, too, and at the tender age of 27, I felt I was just too old to get into that nonsense. So, I gave up 'first and last', redecorated my hovel and stayed in it, alone for a few more years.

I'm feeling about Twitter now the way I felt about ecstasy then: I might be too old for this nonsense. I'm even coming up with research about who's using it, as a way of staying away. Twitter has fewer posters than LinkedIn (140 million versus 150 million), and only a tiny portion of facebook's BILLION users.

However, I feel as though I might be missing something by not having a Twitter account and keeping in touch 140 characters at a time. Hell, even the Queen has a Twitter account. Well, there are several "the queens", actually.

Mind you, Elizabeth Rex doesn't actually sit there and press any of the little buttons on her jewel-encrusted Blackberry, now, does she? She has people for that.

I have no people. What I do have is a full time job, responsibility for most of the domestic duties in my home, a dog who needs an hour-long walk or run each day, three curling teams, a reading habit, email, a blog, facebook, seven magazine subscriptions and a desire to make a quilt this fall. I may be at the tipping point. What would I be willing to give up to become a tweeter? What would I need to do to make it happen? Does one become a 'tweeter' or a 'twit' or what?

I think I may have missed an entire medium, as I've done with cable TV. I have never in my life paid for cable. Satellite TV was included with the place my husband and I shared the first year of marriage, but when we bought our house, we went Over The Air and yes, I admit to being a little sanctimonious about it. (if I ran the food bank, anyone with cable would be turned away with a stern lecture about priorities. Which is why I don't run a food bank; I simply donate and hope for the best.)

The thing is, I'm noticing more and more just how wide the "digital divide" is getting. My 70-year old mother has gone to considerable expense and trouble to get connected at her home in the country so she can Skype to my brother in Australia. But she has never once used the cell phone I gave her three years ago. I know because I pay the bill and the usage is zero. Texting is a foreign language and she still buys a newspaper each Saturday. On paper. For her, twitter is what the birds at her feeder do, all day long.

At the same time, I guarantee you the 21-year old candidate I interviewed for a job at our radio station last year has never in her life written a cheque. And guess where she told me she gets nearly all her news and information? From Twitter.