What I have noticed lately

I rarely go out to eat.  Being single and not dating keep me pretty much in house.  I enjoy cooking for myself and my family anyway.  Being the third wheel is never fun, no matter how sweet people are to you anyhow.  But in the last couple of weeks I have went out to eat about four times with some friends and my daughter.  And what I saw really bothered me....a lot.  At almost every single table people are immersed in ...their phones.  Be it an iphone, blackberry, razor or whatever.  And being a super-de-duper nosybird of the fullest....I strain myself to see what is so intriguing  to these people.  For the most part it is facebook.  Occasionally I saw emails, or google search bars and a few on pinterest but mostly facebook.  Now I don't have a facebook account and I am sure if i did I would be a complete stalker of people I don't even know.  Like some of y'all...  Are we such a shallow, self-absorbed people that we cannot even carry on a conversation with our spouse, friend, daughter, son or the like without our phone in our face???  It is just so sad to me that this has become life to people.  Nothing is that important that it must be filtered through facebook.  If it is a true emergency I sure don't want it put there first.  I was riding in a car with a group of women home from a church event when one of them in the backseat kept on commenting on all these photos and comments she was reading on facebook.  What an opportunity she missed with the four live women in the car she could have fellowshipped with.  Instead she was scrolling through the newsfeed reading what others were doing and the funny part is....she did not really know most of them.  Just....sad.  I am not against facebook, twitter, texting or whatever as types of social media but I am against it when it takes away from reality.  Human reality.  Human voices.  Conversation.  Interaction with others.  Tones we can hear and reflect back to someone.  Growing friendships deeper.  Really ministering to one another.  I know I am a complete dinosaur with technology but I love real live people.  I don't like atm's, bank drives that have no tellers, automation.  I see mommies snapping photos and posting on instagram for their friends to see right away while their child needs a new push on the swing.  But mommy is busy reading every ones reply to their little cutie...that she doesn't even notice.  Something is very wrong here.....very wrong.