Keeping in touch in this brave new world

"Ever-more-real virtual encounters could make us forget what we are missing ... the smell of a grandmother’s cooking, the warmth of an embrace. In interviews, older grandchildren who video chat with grandparents say they visit them less, feeling that they have already “seen” them".

I read a great article in the paper (can we still really say "in the paper" if we read it on-line?) the other day by NY Times columnist Amy Harmon that I just can't quite seem to get out of my mind.

Quite frankly, as one who's far away from family at the moment, I love the latest (and greatest?) techno-communications "schtuff" ... Skype, blogs, Facebook ... Thanks to these "tools", I find that I feel closer than ever to the daily ups, downs, excitements and disappointments in the lives of close family and friends. I often feel terrible for being the "long lost stranger-sister" to my littlest sister in particular, and seem to think that somehow, "if we only used Skype", it would take the "M" out of big sister M.I.A. That said, I have always said that joining Facebook is the number one best way to ruin your high school reunion ... I mean, really, why go at all if you already know what everyone is up to, how they are doing, what their kids' names are and what their partners look like?

But are we heading into a brave new world of distinctly inhuman relationships? Is video chat, blogging, etc poised to be the beginning of an end? What future is there for a generation of kids raised on "digital grandmas". And when it really comes down to it, when you "see" each other over the computer, does it lessen your "need" to see your loved ones live and in person?

"Some veterans of the technology fear that the video cam has started to substitute, rather than supplement, actual time together. Jennifer Ray, 24, of San Antonio, and her brother persuaded their parents to get a new computer so they could all video chat with their respective toddlers on split screens from different states. Now the siblings commiserate about their mother’s unwillingness to travel".