It Went Dark Here

Not literally dark – the kind of dark one has when all their electronic devices fail to connect to the internet. The Optimum modem in my house—my de facto link to the outside world—crashed out this week, and my personality changed immediately. Unable to reach the office on my internet phone, no desktop computer connection to Wi-Fi, no streaming television to continue watching The Madison, and with cell service intermittent at best, I went into a deep funk. I have become so reliant on the internet for not only news and entertainment, but for almost all of my at-home office work. It is particularly disruptive at the moment since I am in the middle of doing research on a new work of fiction. There is a stack of books in the queue to read to keep me busy, but the absence of the internet does create a strange sense of being untethered. When I think back to 2017, when I opened my camp in Maine, there was no cell service or internet. I would go to the parking lot of the local library to use their free Wi-Fi. Now, of course, I have a full operation there with a printer, scanner, phone, TV’s all connected to the rest of the world. The tech pros have been marshaled to come to my house to update the equipment in the basement, while I pound out my column upstairs on a very unmodern typewriter, circa 1955. I will then deliver it to the office, where the internet is full strength, and the typed sheet will be scanned and emailed to The Messenger. Hopefully, by the time this column goes to press, my internet woes will be over. I guess internet addiction is something we all have to live with. Even the fly-fishing characters in The Madison TV show, which is set in rural Montana, seem to have more powerful internet than I do. When I go fishing, I turn off the cell and disconnect, but it is my choice, not Optimum’s.