Red, White and Roux

As regular readers know, I'm a high school English teacher. We've started off the year in the new school building. I have finally mastered the new computer grade book program, gotten my card key to work, learned my codes for the copy machine, and figured out the telephone.

To make an in-house call, I click the down arrow twice to directory. Then I punch another button, then I text in the letter of the last name of the person I am trying to reach, and then I punch another button. The telephone also has voice mail and can be used as an intercom. All this for a person who remembers when there was one telephone in the house and it had a rotary dial. In fact, I still keep one like that to use when the power goes down. It's nice to have a phone line that doesn't require electricity. Take that technology!

I remember the first time I ever saw a cordless telephone. As I recall, it was in the late Seventies. My good friend, Bob Ross, was a techie of the highest order. You know the type. He just had to be first with every new gizmo that came on the market.

He got it honestly. His dad, Art Ross, left a radio career to open the first video store in the Tampa Bay area. Bob's phone was roughly the size of a shoe and he adored walking around the house as he chatted.

He also had the first home video camera I had ever seen. It was as big as the ones the television reporters used, and terribly expensive. He was a rock music critic for the St. Petersburg Times and had accumulated a massive collection of vinyl records. They covered a complete wall. He traded them all for that camera. His friends shook their heads in wonder and dismay.

In retrospect, it might have been a smart thing to do. I've been trying to sell my vinyl collection and it seems no one is really interested in Mott the Hoople's Greatest Hits, The Jeff Lorber Fusion, or Spirit's Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus. Granted, many turntables, mine included, play only one record at a time. One has to carefully remove the disc from the jacket, place it gently on the turntable, position the needle with a light touch, and then repeat the process. All of this effort is necessary to listen to music that will never make it to compact disc. How often do I do it? Rarely. When I do, it is worth the effort to hear the sounds of my youth.

This brings us to remote controls. My students look at me in wonder when I explain the days of one black and white television in the living room that only received two channels via an outdoor metal antenna. We had to get up off the couch to change the station.

I channeled those primitive days last week as students kept delivering remote controls to my room. At first, I smugly said, "Oh, I don't need that. I already have one."

A sophomore patiently explained, "No, Ms. Roux. You need one for the video/DVD player, one for the television, and one for the computer projector."

Aaargh.

I resolve not to be overwhelmed. I can do this. I have learned (well, almost) how to work my home system which requires two remotes and entirely too much button punching.

I am not a technophobe. The Internet is my friend. I use it two or three hours a day for e-mail, shopping, research, and reading newspapers from all over the world. However, in my heart, I know that I am not a natural, like my students who can't even remember a time without computers.

I believe us older guys may be able to blame our Senior Moments on information overload. While trying to remember all of our passwords and user names, we just might lose the name of an old friend, a movie title, or an author's name.

Actually, I think we are to be commended. Try this little exercise that we have been doing at my house lately. Start with your earliest memories of technological advancement. Was it color television in huge consoles with screens shaped like an O with the top and bottom cut off? They cost $500 in 1960's money.

How about calculators that started at three figures and ended up as free giveaways? Remember the transition from film to video? When did you first get a telephone answering machine? At what time did customer service come to mean a touch-tone menu? And how about air-conditioning? How long did it take to go from one window unit to central coolness throughout the house?

I believe we, as a generation, have done really well, and I will learn to use those three remotes, even if I have to ask a student to show me how.

            Denise Roux is a regular columnist for the Apalachicola and Carrabelle Times. To reach her, email her at rouxwhit@mchsi.com