Back in MY Day

Kaitlyn Dunnett/Kathy Lynn Emerson here. Those in my age group (old farts) have a tendency to praise the good old days, just as our parents and grandparents did to us. Since those tales frequently ran along the lines of walking six miles to school in a blizzard, we always took them with a grain of salt. A similar wariness is warranted when “boomers” born in the first couple of years after soldiers came home from World War II start waxing nostalgic and making snide remarks about modern technology.

I am irritated by such things as word processing programs that want to correct my spelling and grammar, whether it needs correcting or not, and the intrusiveness of other people’s cell phone conversations, always carried out in loud voices. I am, frankly, in terror of future developments in AI. Even so, I would not want to go back to doing things the “old fashioned” way.

Before cell phones, there was no way to contact other people unless you had a landline and knew what number to call to reach them. One time back in the late 1960s, I was supposed to meet a friend to give her a ride back to college after spring break. When she did not show up at the pickup point I had no way to get in touch to find out what had happened. Was I waiting in the wrong place? Had she changed her mind or forgotten? The only thing I could do was wait around until it was really obvious she wasn’t going to show and then go on without her.Would that happen today? Probably not.

Before computers, I used a manual typewriter with carbon paper (and liberal applications of White Out) to produce my manuscripts. Enough said. Don’t even get me started on other office equipment.

Before e-mail and text messages, people wrote letters and made phone calls. The letters were long and newsy. Well, e-mails can be, too. There were lots of hour-long or longer phone calls to friends and family, even though long-distance calls could get expensive. I called my parents every Sunday for decades when I was in Maine and they were in New York and then in Florida. If they were still around today, I suppose we’d be in contact via Zoom or Face Time.

Before digital photos and videos, there was no way to tell if you had taken the shot you thought you had until you sent the film away to be processed. My snapshots tended to be out of focus, and I once shot a long sequence of friends in my college dorm with a filter on over the lens. And, of course, with 8mm film, there was no sound.

Before online search engines, research had to be done in print format. I actually miss spending time in the library stacks, but even the best university library wouldn’t have every book and article I needed. Inter-library loans helped, but there was still a lot that wasn’t available unless you could travel to the location where that material was housed. There were experts willing to share knowledge, just as there are now, but instead of instant access via the Internet, where we can ask questions on Google, join groups dedicated to special interests, and find online articles on the most arcane of subjects, back in the day the only options were a cold call on the telephone or a letter. If you could find a phone number or mailing address the recipient might or might not be willing to answer questions.

And did I mention that locating a book in a library required searching though a card catalogue? The system wasn’t difficult, but it took more than a couple of clicks with a mouse to find what you wanted. Thank goodness most libraries had a reference librarian on hand to help.

Before VHS, before DVDs, before Blu-Ray and streaming, I can remember being a young teen and recording episodes of Bonanza with a reel-to-reel tape recorder. I had a wicked crush on Little Joe Cartwright. The recorder was also handy for capturing crank calls to teachers during pajama parties and taping music off the radio.

Overall, things are both better and easier in 2023. I have one word of warning, though. To be able to contact someone by cell phone, the cell phone has to be turned on and the ringer has to be working. The other day, we thought our cat had gotten out of the house. When Sandy spotted a black cat out in the field and couldn’t find Shadow anywhere inside, he set off to try to catch the cat he’d seen. This involved tromping through muddy brown grass still dotted with snow, and thickets, and ditches full of cold snow-melt. I went looking, too, but I’m too wobbly on my pins to be much use, so after he started visiting the neighbors to ask if they’d seen her, I came back home. That’s when it occurred to me to double-check. I got out the cat treats, took them upstairs, and shook the container. Voila! Shadow emerged from underneath the bed. Relieved, I set about trying to reach Sandy to tell him the good news. Yes, you guessed it. He had his cell phone in a case on his belt but he didn’t have the ringer turned up and he couldn’t feel it vibrate. After he eventually came home, we found out that the black cat he’d been chasing belonged to one of our neighbors.

Modern technology has come a long way, but it doesn’t work if you don’t turn it on.

Kathy Lynn Emerson/Kaitlyn Dunnett has had sixty-four books traditionally published and has self published others, including several children’s books. She won the Agatha Award and was an Anthony and Macavity finalist for best mystery nonfiction of 2008 for How to Write Killer Historical Mysteries and was an Agatha Award finalist in 2015 in the best mystery short story category. She was the Malice Domestic Guest of Honor in 2014. Her most recent publications are The Valentine Veilleux Mysteries (a collection of three short stories and a novella, written as Kaitlyn) and I Kill People for a Living: A Collection of Essays by a Writer of Cozy Mysteries (written as Kathy). She maintains websites at www.KaitlynDunnett.com and www.KathyLynnEmerson.com.