Yesterday was my birthday. And my birthday is something that I let slide past me without making any fuss about it. Its a slow quiet day where I contemplate about what i’ve achieved in life and where I count my blessings and am thankfull for all I have. ( I of course also wonder if I am indeed getting older and slowly mutter a curse that my good looks are fading away). But i’m not one of those " Yippie ka Yeey its my birthday types". No big party, no raving half-drunk about the virtues of old age .. no near depressive episodes .. stuff like that.
Usually the day passes with a few phone calls from friends and family who call to congratulate me. (I never know what to say to those, they make me a bit shy and uneasy), the occasional birthday card (fewer and fewer over the years) and that is about that. This year however, that all changed.
The addition of my FACEBOOK PROFILE to my digital lifestyle came with a built in calendar. And that in turn, notified my friends online .. and that changed my birthday experience altogether.
So pretty soon I had friends from far of places sending me best wishes, my Blackberry became abuzz with emails, Text messages started coming in and I even got some phone calls (my mom and my aunt). But all the rest ? All of it was online ! Email, Facebook, Instant messaging.. All of it became digital.
It made me realize just how my life has changed. How I have become a citizen of the world, and the web. How my "social landscape" is much broader then the town I live in. And how importantly I value that "digital lifestyle". And as my perceptions of the world are those of a shrinking planet, bringing us closer together, I feel my horizons broaden as I get to stay in touch with all these different people all over the world. I love it !.
Oh Brave new world.
I’m generally not much of an optimist, mostly cautious in my views on world events. But yesterday the world presented my with a great birthday present. History was made yesterday, as we saw that change, that ANYTHING is possible. The outcome of the elections in the US resonated across the globe. The speech of Barak Obama made living rooms fall silent as people listened in. On Cnn a Hologram reported the victory of a black president in the 2008 elections. Online millions of people commented, participated and experienced the event. It sounds like pure science fiction but it was in fact pure reality. For one , wonderful moment, humanity conviced me that anything is possible if we put our minds to it. : YES WE CAN !