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How Cell Phones Are Destroying Life As We Know It

© Deb Jones

It used to be that I could go to the grocery store, and while I perused the produce and read expiration dates and nutritional values on various containers, I could expect to make eye contact with some other shoppers, maybe exchange a few words here and there. These days, the only person at any store that I can begin to hope will acknowledge my presence is the checkout person. Everyone else has his or her cell phone glued to his or her ear.

I know you've seen them, too. Perhaps you are even one of "them." The shoppers who push their carts with one hand while the other hand, the cell phone hand, holds the miniature electronic device to their ear. These cell phone users have a special faraway look in their eyes, telling you that they are only partially in their bodies; the thinking, conscious part of them is emanating over the airwaves. Forget any eye contact, forget any quick "how are ya?", and forget any social niceties. Unless I am on the other end of one of those cell phones, I am not going to know the warmth of any human contact in my shopping experiences.

And speaking of how a cell phone user dedicates their thinking, reasoning mind to their phone conversations brings to mind the new alertness required of drivers. As if the burgeoning number of automobiles on the road isn't enough to contend with, or the usual potholes and construction areas, but now I must be most mindful of those drivers with cell phones at their ears.

Oh sure, I know some drivers have wizened up, and laws are changing, too, to require cell phone users to use headphones or some other handless method of cell phone usage. As if the only problem with driving and talking on the phone is the use of a person's hand! At least when one hand is on the steering wheel and another is holding a phone to an ear, the other drivers on the road have a clue as to who is paying attention to the road and who is otherwise occupied. Well, at least the other drivers like me who don't own a cell phone.

Cell phones don't just make a driver less alert to driving situations; they change the dynamics within the car they drive. Mothers and fathers no longer have time or energy for small talk with the kids, there is no more time for road games along the way, or other bonding activities. And even if parents had the time for such conversations or activities, chances are the youngsters wouldn't because they are using their own cell phones. Who knows? Maybe they are calling each other, but I sure hate to think that familial communication has deteriorated to that!