Worked Up So Textual

At the risk of sounding like a 75 year old cat lady who "walked to school every day in three feet of snow," let me just say: manners have totally gone to hell these days.

Again, at the risk of sounding like the Unabomber, it's all because of the blasted technology.

I swear to Christ, while walking to class today, I stopped to talk to a friend, and he pulled out his cell phone and began text messaging in the middle of our conversation. He was able to tune me completely out in a matter of 1 second. There was no "excuse me while I take this," no apology for being rude, nothing!

This isn't really an uncommon occurrence... actually it happens quite often among people my age. And when it does, instead of the text fiend apologizing to the unsuspecting conversationalist, the poor talker feels like she is interrupting some secretive exchange that she isn't invited to join.

At any given point in the middle of any given class, at least 90 percent of my classmates are either on lap tops, text messaging, or just totally incapacitated. If I am so miffed about being ignored in favor of words on a cell phone screen, I can only imagine how a professor feels when trying to engage a class full of technology-dependent drones.

Now, I'm not saying that I disapprove of technology completely, I mean, obviously I'm not blogging with a quill and scroll, but something has to give. Are the people of my generation and those after doomed to spend eternity with their fingers attached to a keyboard and their eyes fixed on a screen? Will all forms of in-person conversation eventually become obsolete? And if so, are all the traditional manners that I have known until now doomed to follow?