Liz's Lesson Learned: The Blur And Lure of Technology

I am typing this piece on a computer. Auto-correct and auto-edit suggest changes as fast as I can type the word.  Red, blue, and yellow lines indicate the need to make corrections.  It’s no longer completely up to me as to how things are phrased.  The computer is always making suggestions!  Well, at least I can still decide which suggested changes and edits to accept.  And if all else fails, I can turn the suggestion function off.  I guess that’s something, right? Technology is churning along.  It’s developing at breakneck speed.   It’s all a blur.  And yet we cannot ignore the lure.

My Dad was an information specialist at the Pentagon.  I would go to work with him and watch him reading the news as it came across what was called a teletype machine.  There was this medium-sized room with beige Ish/gray walls. Along one of the walls sat several of these machines.  The rhythmic clicking of those machines sounded like hundreds of fingers striking a typewriter or today on a keyboard.  (Do you know you can turn the computer keyboard clicking sound off, too?)  Oops, that blur that can be a lure!)  Anyway, that was how international and national news was dispatched. All around the world, people like my Dad watched out for breaking news to arrive that needed to be shared.  Back then, those machines were considered up-to-date and capable of getting the news out quickly.

My Mom was an executive secretary at the Pentagon for the Department of Defense.  When I visited her at work, she had to use a combination to open the door to her office.  She sat in what was called a vault.  Her job required her to type correspondence and speeches quickly so they could be dispatched or used by her bosses.  She typed one hundred words a minute on a manual typewriter.  Then she moved to a Selectric electric typewriter. And when she was approaching retirement, the word processing system was just on the horizon. 

I could not believe how fast she could and how she seldom had to roll the paper back up through the typewriter so she could use that white (they would later make it clear) correction fluid on a misspelled word.  Back then, written communication included making copies using yellow, pink, and green carbon paper.  Still, no mistakes can be made (Now, that is something to think about.)

I learned to type on an old-fashioned upright typewriter that you had to push down hard on those keys to get a letter to appear on the paper. I was in the eighth grade, sitting in class looking at a piece of paper on the typing stand that contained the words I had to type accurately on the blank sheet of paper that was in the typewriter. When I learned to type, there was nothing called tape, backspace, or delete keys that corrected your errors. You typed slowly and hoped you did not make a mistake, because you would have to start over. 

And gradually, you were required to type faster and faster because accuracy and speed went together.  At first, that was murder, especially when my submission had to be error-free.  But over time, my typing rate increased all the way up to seventy-five words per minute without errors.  This was no way near my Mom’s speed. 

That was how letters were sent out.  That was how information was shared.  You typed it up and you mailed it out.  Newscasters waited for telegrams, wires or letters. 

Teletype, manual, electric, Selectric, carbon paper, correction fluid, telegrams – the initial lure that would turn into a blur.  That was communication!

Now let us jump ahead to where one of my college jobs.  I created punch cards for use on a mainframe system.  It was in the late seventies and early 80s, and computers were just beginning to gain widespread use. In those days, we were just on the cusp of data processing machines and using software that would replace the typewriter. At first, there was no internet.  The computer was used for word processing, and it wasn’t Microsoft.  It was IBM and WordPerfect who cornered the market.

Then Microsoft appeared on the scene, and we began opting between Microsoft Word and WordPerfect.  Then, in 1983, the internet arrived at my job.  I remember when the law firm I worked at first rolled out the internet on our computers.  We were told to only use it to carry out work-related business.  No surfing just for fun.  (Yep, surfing had moved from swimming to computer searching.)  We were on a network, so the firm knew where we were surfing.  Some folks were reprimanded for surfing in unauthorized territory.

And so, it began...The real age of the technology blur.

Today, in 2025, technology has taken us to a place where the internet is quite the lure to people in many different ways.  To be truthful, what was intended to be groundbreaking in the communication arena has become a detriment to our health and well-being.  Seconds after something happens, it’s relayed around the world.  It seems like the spread of information on the internet is faster than the speed of sound.  (As a matter of fact, I paused my typing of this piece and allowed the lure of the internet to pull me into typing my question into the search engine I typed: “is internet dispersion of information faster than the speed of sound?”  As if by magic, the search engine detected errors and in red, underlined “dispersion” and “information” indicating that I had misspelled them.  So, I corrected the words and hit the enter key.

And, low and behold AI Overview said yes and gave a simplified answer to my question.  There was a University of Physics entry that supplied a more difficult-to-understand answer.  But in essence, the internet was faster than the speed of sound.  I typed in a question and got the answer instantly.  Much easier than going to the library and looking it up using the Dewey Decimal System to cross-reference several books on the topic! (It was a proud moment for me when I finally understood that System!)

I don’t miss having to type on a typewriter.  I do not miss having to research things in the old-fashioned way by going to the library.  It’s much cheaper to search for information on the web than it is to purchase encyclopedia volumes.  (Do you remember those traveling salesmen stopping by to sell those volumes?)  Even shopping is easier on the internet.  Look, you can even do Black Friday online, if that’s your thing.

I appreciate that I can have Zoom chats with my children and grandchildren, including those who do not live in the Washington, DC/Maryland/Virginia area.  I am thankful that I can see what is going on around my house when I travel across the country.  It's cool that I can text (even though I’m awful at it), email, and join various groups to communicate.  Long gone are the days when you had to get your assignment together and rush it over to the professor’s office before that 11:59 pm deadline.  Now, you just work on it until 11:49, upload it to the system, hit send, and the professor gets it right on time.  I must say that that is an enjoyable convenience. 

Now, here is the problem: just as it is easy to get good information, it is also easy to get bad information.  And the lure and blur of technology – we let this thing sneak up on us.  The bad information seems to be taking over our time and sensibilities.  So, I do miss the times when no one was able to use the internet to print guns that can kill. I miss the times when bullying wasn’t global.  I missed the good days… the good old times (I can’t believe I can now refer to things as the good old days) when I could sit down at a meal and not have everybody's faces turned down to their devices.  I miss the times when monitoring what young people were doing wasn’t handicapped and undermined by what they could access on the internet.  I miss the time when friendships were built on people getting to know one another face-to-face.  I do not like the idea that AI can tell you who I am without me telling it that it was okay to do so.  It is a little unsettling that the internet can give you an aerial view of my home, and then you can use that zoom feature to get a closer, more intimate view of where I live. 

Some things I do online and some things I don’t.  I use my Women’s intuition and spirit-driven discerning nature to decide when to and when not to use technology.  I try not to leave the internet open on my devices overnight.  I am cautious and opt not to open things that look suspicious. I’m pretty tech savvy – to a point.  And I enjoy its positive possibilities.  As the blur settles and I become more and more aware of where we are and where we are going, I miss the easy days when the internet was supposed to be a good tool for communicating.  I miss the time when we did not allow the blur and lure to take over our common sense.  I miss our willingness to do away with what is bad and hold on dearly to the good.

Every time I’m introduced to some new type of technology, I hear the warning calls trying to lure me back into blur. I jump out and remember just how all-consuming the blur and lure of technology can be… I DO NOT MISS THAT!!

By Rev. Dr. Elizabeth L.E. Wiggins October 1, 2025