What could be more beautiful than being in flight to wherever and looking out the window of the plane, and realizing you are floating amidst white puffiness? Floating above the clouds can be an awe-inspiring experience.
Those were our thoughts for many years, until this past Shabbat when during a lovely lunch with our children we found out that “clouds” have a totally different connotation these days. It all has to do with Google (we think), and making sure that everything you have done on the computer is in the cloud. Or else we will be in major trouble. However, if everything is in our “dropbox” we are free and clear (we think). Discussions such as the one we are mentioning are reminders to us that we are living in the modern world and not in the clouds!
Euphoria for us used to mean noting a beautiful rainbow after a major rain storm, jumping and making footprints in freshly arrived snow, taking a walk through a forest and becoming awestruck by the changing color of the leaves. We always felt such events were reason enough to feel as though we were floating through the clouds. After our recent family discussion, however, we think we are safer staying here on Earth at all times.
We can’t keep up with the technological changes that are taking place all around us. The terminology alone drives us slightly “batty.” What amuses us, or depresses us, even more is that when we try to understand what is going on, the explainer who is trying very hard to make it clear obviously has a hard time understanding how we do not get it. Fast forward, we want to tell them, another 20 years so they can see if they are on the same page as their children when it comes to whatever devices they are using.
Moving on to the world of passwords: Is it not totally crazy that for anything you want to do these days you must have a password? Some require only letters, while others require capitalized and lowercase letters; still others require letters and numbers; others, one capital letter with punctuation marks and another we found even required a hyphen at some point. Nina actually came up with a great password. At one time she used “Iforgot!” However, the problem is that many sites require that the password be changed every so often. They are so smart that they even know what the last password you used is and tell you that it’s not usable! We have gone through names, particular addresses, friends of friends. What’s next? This is really getting absurd. Is this progress?
Ask most people today for a telephone number and they will immediately have to find it in their phone. Have you ever noticed a person running in and out of their home like a crazy person, or back and forth from a store to their car in a mall parking lot? You can be sure that they have misplaced their beloved cell phone. We still remember our telephone numbers from our parents’ homes, our old addresses and the birthdays of some of our childhood friends, and Nina even remembers how much each of our children weighed when they were born. It seems that these days everything is marked down in that beloved little instrument which, baruch Hashem, has to disappear for at least one day a week. We have noticed that it reappears in the hands of some immediately after Havdalah.
Kudos to our peers who are smiling and chuckling at the above comments. We know we are not alone in our sentiments. We wish we could transmit to all the technological “geeks” out there that they should try to take the time to notice the real clouds. Remember that the real clouds are the ones that bring us all back to the beauty Hashem has bestowed upon us.
By Rabbi Mordechai and Nina Glick
Rabbi Mordechai and Nina Glick are living in Bergenfield after many years of service to the Montreal Jewish community. Rabbi Glick was the rav of Congregation Ahavat Yisroel as well as a practicing clinical psychologist in private practice. He also taught at Champlain Regional College. The Glicks were frequent speakers at the OU marriage retreats. Nina coordinated all Yachad activities in Montreal and was a co/founder of Maison Shalom, a group home for young adults with special needs. They can be reached at [email protected].
