The corner of Southport and Addison spoke to me.
“I’ll you have is now. #Give presence.”
I’m sure it was part of a 2014 Miracle-on-34th-Street holiday campaign with the SoPo shopping strip. Retailers wanting not to want their materialistic side to be the focus of December. I loved it on two levels! First, I’m sure Christmas makes or breaks many of those Southport boutique stores. They need to sell merchandise. Their survival depends on #give presents. Still, they went along with it or at least didn’t fight it. Secondly, I believe in this sentiment.
In an era, where many of us are carrying around a hand held computer, it’s hard to be truly present at a party, in a conversation and even at work. We coexist in the real world and a virtual world. At work, after I finish a project, I like to celebrate by scanning my virtual world. From my unglamorous and not-well-heated office, it’s fun to take a pause and step into the Facebook realm. I can enjoy Jen’s Viet Nam trip pictures, Theatre Bob’s rant on people working from home, and of course the many updates on people’s commuting experiences in #chiberia. Facebook is a weird plethora of information and nothingness. Some posts are funny. Some are inspirational. Some are just plain sad. I’m always amazed by what people share. And curious why they share it. I often leave Facebookland dazed by some bizarre oversharing.
And besides Facebook, there’s twitter, pinterest, instagram, snapchat, youtube, and the vast, limitless internet. We may be physically in the room. But are we really giving presence? Are we paying more attention to the people outside the room than the person that is choosing to spend time with us?
I’ve heard boastings of a dame who won’t allow her children or her children’s children to text or be on their phones in her presence. I know of a restaurant that if a server or bartender is caught on a cell phone, they are written up. I’m not one for punitive authority. These proclamations don’t help eliminate the distraction. It reinforces hiding the action.
I don’t want to force someone to put their phone away and pay attention to me. That just sets both of us up to be miserable. Simply put, I need to choose to spend time with people who want to spend time with me. I can’t compete with google. I don’t think that fast. I’m not as dazzling as Candy Crush. I can’t keep a comment to 140 characters. I’m not up for spending an evening posing for pictures to show everyone on Facebook that I’m having a good time. I just want to have a good time with little to no photographic documentation.
I’m consciously trying to spend less time in front of computer and phone screens. I’m carving out time to meet people in the real world and connect in-person. Even before the last decade of technology advancements, I was never a huge fan of the phone. I like to see people when I talk to them. The non-verbal cues are as important as the words. And a cute emoticon can’t replace seeing someone actually smile, laugh, clap, or give you the thumbs up. It’s so much more personal to connect in person.
I only have now. So, I’ll give presence! It’s cheap and high quality. And when done right, it can have life altering effects.