I was talking with my husband this morning about our land line telephone. It costs a hundred dollars a month to keep a line for the fax and one for the phone. We rarely use the fax, so do we really need to keep paying for that line? We each have Smart Phones, but somehow having it makes me feel, what, secure? Are we emotionally tied to the phone simply because it's what we've always known? Remember the days when there were phone exchanges? The days when there was a real person sitting behind a panel full of holes connecting every caller by hand? I'm not quite that old, but I did work at a company as a receptionist and I had to handle an updated version of that phone system for the building. Those were innovations at one time too. I think about the attachment to the familiar and I begin to understand the state of this country. The discord is a by-product of change. Change happens. It happens to everything. In our discussion about losing of the phone, I felt discomfort. Having a phone sitting in the same place at all times that you know will never run out of battery feels safe. It's not comfortable letting go of the things that made YOU feel safe. The things that defined YOUR life. We've just always had a phone attached to our house. And when I hear people say that they've gotten rid of theirs, I cringe a little. We still write checks when a large majority of people do their checking on-line. It feels safer. I'm sure the changes that are happening in our country feels wrong for some people, but holding on doesn't stop the generational push and pull. I notice that the people making the loudest noise right now in the world of politics are some of the same people who made the loudest noise in the sixties and seventies. The "love and peace generation" seems to have grown into the "Me" generation which grew into the "Free Trade/Corporate/wealth generation and now it's the "No" generation". Is that me? I hated Twitter at first and now I tweet all the time. I went from PC to Mac. I have a "Crackberry". I welcome new technologies. I want cleaner energy sources. I want to own a flying car. If I have to let go of the old to get to those things, I will try very hard to stay open and make the leap. Now we just have to convince my father-in-law who lives with us. He's a different matter all together.