Look! Up in the sky!

Yesterday as I was driving to chemotherapy, I heard a news report that really got me to thinking. The report said that three more major newspapers have closed their doors just in the last week. I can't remember all of the numbers and statistics, but the business of printing and selling newspapers is in a precarious state. Will our children even ever buy a newspaper at a newsstand? Will the newsstand be headed to extinction to join the phone booth?

So when was the last time that you went into a phone booth to make a call? When is the last time that you even saw a phone booth or a public phone? I think we have survived very well without the phone booth on every corner, but didn't you worry where Superman would change into his suit, as these public utilities began to disappear?

I don't want to be a dinosaur. I want to accept change and to also embrace change, as I use technology in the classroom and in my everyday life. I like this quote that I had on my board at school.

"Disconnecting from change does not recapture the past. It loses the future."
Kathleen Norris

I have to admit that I was a little sad as I listened to this news report and I realized that newspapers are on the way out. I am the first to admit that I now go online each morning and peruse at least three newspapers. Many of our young people have rarely, if ever, read a newspaper in the print form. But wait, there are things that an online newspaper cannot provide! I feel these things will be missed:

• What will we use to start our fires? Newspapers have provided country boys with free kindling for years. E-news does not provide this dual use.


• The crinkle of the pages of the newspaper being turned at the Saturday breakfast table. Will our children have memories of the the computer booting up?


• Memories of fighting over the "funnies." You can't separate sections of the electronic news.


• The newspaper that is left at the coffee shop or restaurant for others to read. You won't leave your laptop to share the news with others.
  
• Rolling up the newspaper, placing it strategically in your back pocket, and going to the bathroom. Much of the news has been read by Kevin Weaver while sitting alone on the porcelain throne. I can honestly say that I have never taken my laptop to the toilet.


• Holidays at G-G's house (my mom) as my two brother-in-law coaches and I fought over the sports page. To the winner would go the spoils, and to the loser, the sale ads. Guess those fights will soon be over.
  
• The all-important paper-boys (speaking as a former paper deliverer) have all but vanished. Not quite the same "zing" in a double click as in hearing that paper bundle hit your front porch (or roof top - whoops!).

Evolution is defined as "a process of change in a certain direction." I might not always like the direction, but if I want to be a valid, functioning part of this ever changing world, I must embrace and connect to it.