I was recently heartbroken. Cory Monteith, one of my favorite “Glee” characters of all time, passed away. I know all the other gleeks in the world are mourning right now, and I mourn with you. But something caught my attention while reading all the posts and tweets. It was when I checked his Twitter account, that he didn’t seem dead at all. And I realized that it’s one of technology’s tragedies. That someone who just posted a new status or new tweet just minutes ago could die in a flash. And when you look at their profile, it seems like they just logged out or just went offline. For me it makes moving on a hell a lot harder. And with different sets of technologies, it’s really hard to move past something that seems so alive.
Cellphones – Have you seen P.S. I love you? When her husband died, she went to sleep every night crying while she constantly called her husband’s phone because she listened to his voice machine. Do you know how frustrating that might have felt? That the only way to hear your loved one was through calling his phone? And then you have the text messages. Those messages that made you swoon, messages you regret, and the things you could have said. Tragic.
Camera- This evil little device could relive your happiest moments and turn it into bittersweet memories. Because you know you could never see that smile again, you could never take picture perfect moments ever again, you could never see them really move. It’s downright unfair. You can see them in a picture or a video, but you could never do in real life. Sneaky little things.
Internet- And of course, the jerkiest invention when it comes to death. With Facebook and Twitter and other accounts, you can sit there and pretend that they just logged out. You could open their account and see the pictures, the memories, the things that made them alive. Because right now they’re not alive. They’re dead. To make matters worse, people actually post or message the dead person’s account to say that they would be missed. Does heaven have Wifi? I don’t think so.
As evil as these inventions are, they can also serve as a way to immortality. You could never really die, you are frozen in time. You may be dead for hundred of years, and yet when a person cares to search you name, your picture pops up, like you never left. And so I leave the decision to you, to decide if technology is evil or good.
To all gleeks out there, let’s take a time to breath. Cory’s just taking a midnight train going anywhere.. 🙂