The Information Highway Has No Speed Limit

I glance in my rear-view mirror, immediately recognizing the flashing red and blue lights coming for me since I'm the only vehicle in sight at this particular time of day. "Fuck", I mutter to myself and start looking for a safe spot to pull over. Anxiously, I stuffed my cell phone into my purse so it wasn't obvious I'd been using it while driving, which is the reason I didn't notice I was going 40 over the speed limit. Reluctantly I ease my car onto the gravel shoulder of the highway and the red and blues close in right behind. After a quick peek in the mirror, I nervously hit the window button and opened my side window slightly.

"Good afternoon ma'am", the officer's deep voice bellows through the crack of the window, beginning the conversation. He just called me ma'am, I think to myself. That's a bit insulting, coming from this strappingly handsome young man, clearly about 35 years my junior, towering beside my vehicle looking polished in uniform, "Are you in some kind of a rush? Can I please see your license and registration?" Unenthusiastically, I open the window fully to produce my documents to him and with obvious embarrassment, I shove my hand out the window surrendering my eligibility to still be driving at this age, despite what I may appear like to him, and I already know why I got pulled over so I remain silent. Minutes later he returned from his police cruiser and announced he had good news and bad news for me. I asked for the bad news first and he produced a substantial speeding ticket for me, accompanied by the documents I previously handed him. I then asked for the good news and he graciously advised me he "knocked my ticket down" so I wouldn't lose any driver's points, patting empathetically on the roof of my vehicle, and with a radiant grin on his face, wished me a good day. "Thank you officer", I replied, desperately wanting to call him young man to retaliate his earlier ma'am comment, but respect for authority is my upbringing so I refrained. How was he even able to start clocking me on his radar from so far back, I muse, he had to be a couple of miles behind when he decided to close the gap and apprehend me. Technology is so damn precise these days, it can be quite ubiquitous.

There's an app for everything now. The world would grind to a grave silent stand-still if access to our superlative technology highway was somehow cut off.  From an aerial view, the illumination of our tiny globe in the vast solar system would begin blinking and flickering like candles blowing out in a breeze, one candle at a time until the whole orb was black and silent; Earth no longer to be heard from. It's an underlying threat hinting precariously in our fast-paced lives each day.  Before computers and vast technology enhancements, life just toddled along and the menace of enemies across the globe was just a coffee shop conversation amongst old-timers who met up with each other, daily.

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I remember our telephone, back in the day, attached to the wall in the kitchen. It was a black rotary phone with a curly cord attaching the handset which stretched out about six feet for walking convenience while you chatted to someone on the other end of the call. Other sophisticated homes had even longer cords to stretch out if you were rich. For the benefit of Generation Alpha and Gen Zs, they were black rectangular heavy-duty plastic boxes with a dial on the front of it with holes for your fingers to dial with, protruding out from the wall, conveniently for people to bump their heads on. I remember our princess phone in the living room, aka the front room. It was an oval-shaped beige phone that sat on the end table in the corner, also had rotary dial technology, but it didn't have the extra long curly cord. Back in the mid-20th century phones were hard-wired right into the wall and portable phones hadn't yet made their debut. Heck, even hard-wired wasn't a definitive term used in those times. That's just how telephones were connected. There were no cordless phones, and no option to move a phone to another room and plug it into a phone jack. Typically, there were two or three phones per household, perhaps two upstairs and one downstairs. When the phone rang, you ran from wherever you were to answer it before the caller hung up; no caller ID either. There was no quick dial tone indicating you had a message because the technology of leaving messages wasn't yet a thing. We had no notification that a call had been missed either; it was quite simple. Then, along came push-button phones instead of rotary dials, which was a gigantic step forward; things were getting fancy.

As a young schoolgirl, way back then, computers weren't yet a precursor in technology, not even in the secretary's office, nor the principal's - and Heaven forbid anyone should end up there to be disciplined with a good old strapping. Yes, in those days the principal and the teachers were allowed to strike children when they necessitated discipline. Chalk still squeaked on blackboards and I learned to type on a vintage Underwood manual typewriter, once I reached high school. 

In fact, if I dig back far enough in my childhood memories, hi-fis and colour TVs were a fairly new hi-tech exploit in most family dwellings. That was our state of technology. But someone still had to get up and walk over to the television set and manually turn the dial to change the channel, a selection of about twelve choices.

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Just like that, in the flash of a moment, or so it seems, 60-some years later I'm flying down the highway like a damn teenager, driving recklessly and care-free, totally distracted by an electronic gadget in my hands, completely disregarding the law, and the safety of other drivers who share the same road, and gaining myself a huge speeding ticket that the young man proudly claimed he "did me a solid" on. What year is this, wait, what decade is this? I feel a bit lost, a little behind the ever-flowing river of technology that rapidly flows and feeds newer technology on a day-to-day diet plan that people and society and almost every aspect of life depend upon; for decades this electronic innovation has been overwhelming the word. Let's face it, we need our gadgets. It's like fast food. But it wasn't always that way. 

Carrying on to my lunch destination, now using my cruise control, I dig my cell phone back out of my purse to make a phone call, hands-free, of course. Fifteen minutes ago when I got pulled over, I was texting but not hands-free. I speculate what that fine young officer would have done had he realized that, glad he didn't though, because the speeding ticket still stings - a $180.00 grab from my pension. That hurts considering I'm now on a limited monthly income. Not so many years ago, texting wasn't an option, and it was still legal to talk on your cell phone without the benefit of Blue-tooth hands-free technology while driving. But even years before that period, cell phones didn't exist; things were quite simple back then and I probably wouldn't even have been caught speeding. I'm not sure hands-free is less distracting though, I tend to get lost in conversation and neglect what's happening around me in traffic. I've almost been involved in a collision at an intersection in the city because I was wrapped up in a hands-free tête-à-tête and didn't notice the red light.

"Hello?"

"Hi Grace, it's me. Are you at the restaurant yet? I'm running late. I got pulled over and got a huge fucking speeding ticket".

"Yes, I'm here. I got a table for us. The daily lunch special looks delicious. I've been here for about 15 minutes. How far away are you?"

"I should be there in about 15 minutes," I tell her. 

"Okay, hurry then. I'll wait till you get here to order. See you shortly."

I kick off the cruise control and step on the gas pedal since the damage is already done anyway. Tomorrow may or may not even come.