Technology

A couple days ago was furniture moving day at the University.

I just wrote that and realized that I haven’t explained what my job is.

I work at Fresno Pacific University as the Summer Housing and Conference Coordinator. My job is basically to check in groups who stay on campus overnight and make sure they have what they need. I then check them out when they are done and clean up after them. I also make sure everything is in line for students who live on campus over the summer either for work or for summer school.

ANYwho, my job falls into the Residence Life Department, and this morning we received a shipment of new furniture for the living areas of the modules (residence halls). I was supposed to be up at 6 to receive a call from the guy driving the furniture truck. I set my alarm for 5:30, it went off, and I decided to go back to sleep and wait for the call to wake me up.

Welllll the call never came and I ended up sleeping past the initial off-loading of all the furniture. Needless to say when one of my coworkers called me asking where I was at 8:45, I was a bit put off with myself.

This made me realize how much I rely on alarm clocks to get me going in the morning. If it weren’t for the simple function on my phone, I would be so lost, and probably without a job. I just think it’s interesting how so many of us rely on a little gadget to tell us when to start our day.

Back before there was such a thing as a digital clock, even a wristwatch, people were able to get up exactly at the time that they needed. They relied on the rooster or the sun to wake them. Children were woken by their parents instead of a screeching beep. If you hit mom, you were in trouble. If you hit the alarm clock, it’ll just try to wake you up again in 5 minutes and not think anything of it.

It’s interesting how we have fallen back on our technology to the point that without it, we are out of luck. This flows into the world of computers, cars, elevators, phones, and many many other things. Since this post is already a bit long, I’ll let you answer this question for yourselves: have we relied on technology too much?