The great and positive influence of computers and the Internet

Just as the article about the great and positive influence of public libraries was inspired by a quotation from Terry Pratchet, this article was inspired by something that the writer Sylvia Engdahl says in her online autobiography, which can be found here. 

Where Terry Pratchett paid tribute to public libraries, Sylvia Engdahl mentions the great and positive difference that computers and the Internet have made to her life. 

I have covered the debt that I owe to public libraries; now it is time to do the same for some other major positive influences in my life. I have a tribute of my own to pay to computers and the Internet. 

Computers as saviours
From Sylvia Engdahl's inspiring autobiography:

“...I still have my desktop computer, with which I spent most of my time anyway, and my laptop, which I use when lying down. And I still have access to the Internet. So I’m in as close touch with the world as I ever was. That is the miracle of computer technology—no one today need be isolated, regardless of physical disability. Computers have been my salvation from youth, when by chance I was hired as a programmer, until old age, when without them my productive life would end.”

Just like Sylvia Engdahl, I was once a programmer by profession. 

I too have always thought of this as my salvation: I still hate to think of what might have become of me if I hadn't managed 'by chance' to get into the world of IT. Programming gave me the opportunity to do some of the things that I do best; it improved my mental abilities and gave me some transferable skills; it gave me more self-respect, a decent income and a home of my own.

There is more to say about this, but for now I want to concentrate on what computers and the Internet can do for people who are housebound for whatever reason. I have had first-hand experience of this because of the restrictions caused by COVID-19.

Small synchronicities

I have a few further coincidences to report. They are nothing like so spectacular as the ones in the article about the green men, but even small synchronicities seem worth recording.

Red Dwarf
I was sitting on a bus recently thinking about the many outside errands I had planned for the day, when I suddenly remembered that this was the day that all of the episodes from one of the later series of the TV science fiction programme Red Dwarf were being shown. 

I didn’t want to miss anything – I had seen this particular series only once before - so I decided to go straight home after visiting the first shop on my list and save the other tasks for another day. 

Just as I made this decision, someone in the seat behind me started whistling the Red Dwarf theme song:

“It's cold outside
There's no kind of atmosphere
I'm all alone, more or less
Let me fly far away from here…”

I didn’t like to turn round and see what sort of person might have picked up and reacted to what I was thinking about, so now I will never know who it was who read my mind!

Reading and thinking in synch with the TV
I wish that I had made notes of the numerous occasions many years ago when I was reading or thinking about something only to hear the same word or phrase synchronously being spoken on the TV.

It happened so often that I came to think of it as normal.

It is still happening.

For the first time in many years, I started to think about someone I used to work with. He once made a ‘T’ sign with his hands and told me that it was a way to ask for time in baseball. 

Just as I remembered this, someone on the TV made that same sign. 

I was just reading “Open your eyes” in a book when I heard this expression on the TV. 

I have started to record recent occurrences of this phenomenon. Any more really good ones will be reported on here.