Low-tech suits me fine
There’s something about my Facebook profile photo that some people find amusing. It’s an orange metal rectangle, so small and insignificant that I didn’t really even notice it in the photo until people started making fun of it.
In the photo, I am atop a mountain on the Great Allegheny Passage, sitting on a bench next to my bike, looking out over the green valley below. It was taken a few years ago after a bike ride up the trail to the Big Savage Tunnel. With a bandana covering the top of my head and two long braids falling across my shoulders, it is far from a glamour shot. But that’s not what people were mocking.
“Nice iPod,” noted one friend.
“Time to enter the 21st century,” said another.
Perhaps the strongest take-down came from my tech-savvy son.
“Why not just get an eight-track player and mount it on your handlebars,” he said, teasing.
That little orange thing attached to my bike handlebars was an iPod nano, one of the MP3 music players first introduced by Apple when my kids were toddlers. There have been many newer generations of the technology, but my orange one is at least 10 years old.
Feeling a bit defensive, I explained to my son that it’s small enough to tuck into a little pouch on my handlebars. When I ride, I use one earphone, and listen to tunes. When I get tired of my playlist, I plug the iPod into my computer and download some new ones.
“People do that on their phones now,” my son said. “I can help you set it up.”
“But it works,” I said. “And they don’t make these anymore. Why would I change?”
It got me thinking about the other things I own and use that younger and more tech-reliant people might find archaic, or even quaint. I use a wall calendar that hangs in the kitchen. I don’t use my phone for keeping my schedule, nor do I email or watch videos on my phone. For that I use a laptop computer that’s also from a previous decade. I read books made of paper and ink, and I cook from actual cookbooks. I tune my guitar using my piano keys – not a digital tuner. I count my daily 10,000 steps (OK, 6,000 steps) in my head and not with a Fitbit or a phone app.
And that phone? It’s going on 6 years old. I’ve let my kids have the upgrades. Mine still does what I need it to do: talk on the phone and send an occasional text. I don’t use it to pay bills.
My son offered to help me put my music onto my phone, but then I’d have to buy wireless earphones in order to listen to it. It seems like a lot of extra effort and money.
“You’re probably the last person alive who’s using the iPod,” he said.
“It’s not like I still wear shoulder pads,” I said.
Maybe one day my iPod will stop working and I’ll have to upgrade. The thought of that feels like a lot to take on when it’s not necessary.
The nice weather this week has me craving a bike ride. My Marin steel-frame hybrid is going on 20 years old. I’ve thought about upgrading, but why? It will get me to the top of that mountain again, pulled along by some nice tunes from that quaint, little, orange tool. It all still works.