Saturday night I went to see my best friend's girlfriend play with the symphony. She's not a professional musician but she's still very good. What really stood out to me was that, during the performance, all of our phones were off, and all we did was sit in the audience and quietly listen to the music. What a novel idea! There were times when I wanted to know something but I had to content myself that the music was still enjoyable despite not knowing anything about who composed it. Later, after the performance, we went to a diner and reflected on the speed with which smartphones became such a ubiquitous object, to the extent that we can hardly remember what our lives were like without them. And I'm sure for some people that is literally true; they cannot remember their lives without smartphones. As I walked my dog this morning I noticed a man walking towards us; he didn't see us until we were very close to him because he was looking down at his smartphone. And this was in the dark! The sun still hadn't risen yet, so it was very possible that he would have tripped and fallen. Nevertheless, he could not draw himself away from the screen to watch where he was going.
