Ditching the Internet

It’s very hard to go cold turkey when it comes to the Internet. The lure of magical eye candy that it offers is like a Pandora box for some. Some might say it’s almost like a drug. Ditching the Internet is hard for some. Cartoonist James Sturm plans to give up on the net. He is going old school and corresponding strictly by snail mail for now. With the recent wave of smart phones and iPads, it will be ever hard to pry away from the clutches of the Internet. More and more people are trying to get their lives back and ditching social sites that eat up some many hours. Online fame is fleeting for some and truly demanding on family time.

“It all goes by so fast,” is one of the those clichés you hear throughout your life, but now, when another parent says it as we discuss the joys and sorrows of child rearing, it sounds like the most poignant thing I’ve ever heard. The question I’ve been wrestling with lately is whether it’s all going by so fast because that’s just the reality of middle age or because of the way I’ve been living my life. Specifically, I’ve started to wonder whether that feeling might be connected to all the time I spend online. Too often I sit down to dash off a quick e-mail and before I know it an hour or more has gone by.