Technology

As I sit here I'm surrounded by my cell phone, two ipods, an HDTV and a beautiful 20 inch imac. In my purse you'll find a digital camera, my portable GPS unit and a PDA (that I won't even use anymore). You would think that with all of this technology that my life would be extremely easy but I find it is probably more complicated than it should be.

I used to be one of those people that would carry a PDA and a paper organizer. Its redundant, I know, but I thought it would better for me. First I would write down an appointment in the paper organizer and then I'd go into my PDA and record it there too. I really need to work on letting things go. Finally I parted ways with the paper organizer because I found myself recording some appointments in one place but not another and it was a mess.

I remember when I would just grab a pen and paper and go to town if I wanted to write. Now if I want to write, I have to get my desk to be perfect. The light in the room has to be just perfect. I have to eliminate as many of the distractions that I can and then hope that my computer doesn't erase something. I'm waiting for the day that one of my characters says "did you remember to save" because that's the mantra I run through my head as I type. With the pen and paper there was so much more freedom, I could relocate myself if my surroundings weren't just right where I was. Maybe its time for me to start looking at laptops.

There are areas that technology has made my life immensely easier. My ipod...now ipods...are a life saver. I love music so much and now I can have it at my fingertips without having to lug a million CDs wherever I go. Though my ipod touch, which I love, could prove to be a major distraction. This afternoon, instead of studying anatomy I found myself twittering, playing a game and reading a book. Its a bundle of greatness that could be the undoing of my graduate experience. But I am stronger than the ipod touch. I think it will come in handy, there are flash card programs that I can make my own flash cards and then carry them with me. When you're known to have 8 inch stacks of notecards for certain exams, this will be a huge space saver.

I think over the next year I'm going to look into stream lining some of my electronics. Maybe cut back to one ipod and a laptop. Though I probably will always have more electronics than I could ever need. I don't think I could ever advocate completely eliminating technology from my life, but I think I need to learn to balance it better in my life.