ANYBODY? I NEED ANSWERS

I have promised (well at least I have tried) not to sound like an old fogy who simply refuses to understand that yesterday is over and what matters is today. O.K. I need some answers. I want to try to better understand today’s “culture.”

Why do hundreds of otherwise sane people start lining up at 3 a.m. to buy the newest IPad? What is the compulsion to be first? Do these people know something I don’t know? Is the IPad a prestige symbol? Is anyone waiting to see what the new pad from RIM will be like? Will IPad buyers stay faithful as if they are cheering for the home team or something?

Can anyone tell me why tattooing has become rampant? I have a certain bias about it being the domain of a certain class of people. My closest friend’s grandson, a math teacher in Florida, and apparently wildly popular among his students, is tattooed from wrist to armpit. I asked him why? He just looked at me. Watching the Food Network (a passion of mine) I heard a really good chef describe how he dressed to suit himself – jeans, Tshirts – all the stuff that made him the individual he wanted to be. But he too had joined the tattoo herd – covering his forearms with what the Druids called Woad. Maybe that’s the answer. It’s some kind of atavistic desire to return to pre-Christian roots?

Can anyone tell me why hundreds, probably thousands of people are, right this minute, walking along the sidewalk with their heads down as they read all their “important’ text messages? Can anyone explain the madness of a young woman I saw recently so intent on the contents of her smart phone that she stepped off the curb against a red light narrowly missing the fender of a turning car. She jumped back. Did she lose her text message?

Can anyone tell me why so many women still put their purses in the shopping cart as they cruise a supermarket? It was years ago that someone reached into my wife’s purse and made off with money.

Can someone please explain, and this is about my most boring topic: cell phones – what seems to draw people to the screen? A few weeks ago I sat in a hospital waiting room readying my EBook. Next to me a young man was vigourously working at something on his Smart Phone. What could it be? His thumb was flicking back and forth as the images spun madly across the screen. I was tempted to ask him to tell me what the attraction was. I’d have received the same blank look I got from my friend’s grandson when I asked him about his tattoos.

Finally, and I have asked this before in different ways: why does anyone who is 20-something or 30-somthing always seem amazed that my wife and I continue to be active? Have they never known anyone over the age of 40? How are they with their own parents? Grandparents?

Can anyone tell me why, given the rising price of gasoline and the continuous griping about it, do so many (maybe most) drivers pull away from stoplights like frightened rabbits? Drive way over the speed limit on highways? I ask again: do they know that slowing down will more than make up for the increase in the price of fuel, and it’s kinder to the environment.

So many questions? So few answers. But in my life, especially when I was more in the public eye, I always said that the most important thing was not the answers – it was the ability to develop questions.

Anyone???