Just for the heck of it here's Suzi Quatro
When I was teaching at a school in SF a colleague once asked if when I got home after work I kicked off my shoes, poured a glass of wine and turned on the telly. First of all I don’t drink and secondly I don’t turn on the TV when I get home from work unless there’s a football match (soccer game, to you Yanks) on that I want to watch. Another fellow teacher speculated that I lived in the Berkeley Hills. I pointed out that I’d been a teacher most of my professional life so could no more afford a home in the hills than a yacht.
I suppose these two instances point to how we make up stories about people we don’t know intimately. We imagine what their significant other is like, what kind of place they live in and what they do in their spare time. Or we leave it all blank. I don’t tend to create stories for people I know. Now people I don’t know at all, there’s where I’ll go to town. Sometimes I’ll observe a person perhaps on a bus or in a cafe and imagine their background, what they’re doing and what fate has in store for them. In some of these stories I’ll interact with them. Nine times out of ten I’ll make their lives happy and successful. I might have them overcome some sort of adversity. It can pass the time and is good for the creative juices and the brain in general.
As I’ve gotten older (or, more accurately, old) I’ve been sure to keep my brain busy. I do a few world puzzles on the internet everyday, namely Octordle and Wordle and sometimes Connections. I also do the crossword in the Times. Writing as often as I can, like this stuff right here, also helps. Not to mention the fact that I’m still teaching. In other words I’m doing all I can to ward off dementia.
I understand that exercise also helps the brain and I go to the gym regularly. It’s one thing to live a long life but we really want the quality to go with it, both physical and mental. I don’t suppose the fact that I’m back in therapy hurts. Reading is good too and I’ve always been a bibliophile.
It seems to me that scrolling the internet is not particularly good for your brain regardless of your age. All those short bits of info, the quick looks at photos, the memes. Much better to be reading narratives, analyses, extended opinion pieces, personal accounts etc. People used to — likely still do — complain about TV rotting kids’ brains. Surely sitting in front of a set isn’t the best thing for you but I think it better than staring at your smart phone.
I was just reminded of something again from my time working in SF. This was about fourteen years ago at the dawn of the smartphone. We had a meeting after school one day. I was chatting with two colleagues. One bragged to the other that he didn’t have a smartphone yet. She responded that she didn’t either. It was point of pride to them that they hadn’t succumbed to the latest trend. They were rebels and old school. I rolled my eyes (figuratively, though maybe literally too). During the course of the meeting we were told about a phone number we were required to have in case of an emergency like earthquake, power outage or major fire. It was written on the board. While people were scrambling to write it down I put it in an email that I sent to the entire staff. Took me seconds. I raised my hand and announced what I’d done and received thanks from all around the room. I then looked at my two aforementioned colleagues, held up my phone and said, “smart phone,” then I smiled. Within a few months they’d both acquired smartphones. Occasionally there’s a good reason that something is popular.
One last thing. Yesterday in class I showed a video to students related to their reading in the course book. I then asked them to write a reflection in which they could say anything they wanted related to watching the video. A nineteen-year-old French woman wrote a few sentences on the topic then concluded by saying that the video was a little bit long for her. It was eight minutes and thirty-six seconds. When you’re raised on TikTok I imagine eight minutes and thirty-six seconds can seem like an eternity.
No comments:
Post a Comment