Train to technology !! thoughts random- randomly expressed

Train Journey! 
Slow local! Going from one station to the next. Enjoyed it thoroughly.
It was fascinating and fulfilling! I took a slow local from Santacruz to Elphinstone, starting from buying the ticket, climbing up the staircases and escalators, busy people, and backpacks on the front. (When asked, one girl replied for safety reasons.) But a big but: there is a big difference in 20 years. 
The noise of chattering has been reduced to a greater extent. Should I say thanks to technology? Or should I feel sad that technology has isolated individuals?
Either busy listening to songs, few pretending to listen to them, few people speaking from their late monthly cycle to mum-in-law's issues, everything under the Sun, oblivious to others...
Casual conversation and getting to know and help one another all faded slowly into the distant horizon.

Hindsight !!!     
Why not think in these terms? The world has become compact with palm-sized equipment; you don't need to take time off to meet near and dear ones. All love and hate are just a keypad away. Using it efficiently and blaming it is obviously our choice. 
What's required as a tool of communication is such handy equipment. This piece of equipment now functions in ways that were not possible before.
 From banking shopping to online transactions from food to white goods, you name it and have it. 

Adapting to technology has become a child's play for people like us born in the late 1950s and 1960s. 

At the same time, yearning for old times is stressful for us. 
The physical warmth and exchange of pleasantries like visiting each other on special occasions, unannounced surprise visits of cousins near and far, casually dropping in to stay for a couple of days, sudden night show movies,  devotional mood to go to temples and just sitting in the terrace and gossip about the neighborhood boys and girls, wearing same color dresses, playing make believe skits, writing songs of our own and singing in totally not synchronizing voices. 
Utter innocence, no deceit, no jealousy, and no bias. 
Parents never treated anybody as unimportant. They loved everyone in the family and their kin and kin were the same. They were not partial or biased in sharing anything and showed immense hospitality despite economic conditions.
The aforesaid experiences are priceless, but they are lacking in this age of technology. We miss them because we went through them. The current generation doesn't miss them because they haven't experienced them. One can only miss them if one has had a taste of them. 
A 20-minute train journey has taken the thought train from here to the past, one generation to the other, the boon and bane of technology.

It is all in the mind. Enjoy the moment and go with the flow. Don't pine for what is not.



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