Open Writing

"Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises, sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not."

These melodious words of Caliban in Shakespeare's play 'The Tempest' filtered into, or out of, my mind while I sat in the theatre of life one day last week. The theatre of life? Well, yes. My seat was at a table on the pavement outside my favourite coffee and cake shop. The stage was the footpath around me. The actors were the passers-by, the busy throng of people going to and fro on their daily business.

Apart from the occasional prattle of small children, the noises around me provided very little delight. My personal space was invaded by a loud conversation at the table behind me. Not that I'm keen on that phrase, personal space. It's somewhat pretentious, a symptom of the pop psychology of the Me generation. The area around me at the pavement café was no more my personal space than anyone else's.

Nevertheless, the young people behind me were talking in such loud voices that I switched off my hearing aids to repel at least some of the invasion. It's rather silly to have a pair of high tech digital devices in your ears to enable you to hear what someone is saying, and to use them because you don't want to hear what someone is saying. Just another one of the strange acts in the theatre of life, I suppose.

What made the situation even stranger was that the young people were not even talking to each other. They were chattering loudly and at the same time. It was not a two-way conversation. I glanced round. The disturbing truth became apparent. They both had mobile phones almost glued to their ears and each of them was talking to somebody else far away. They had to shout, of course, because the mouthpiece of a mobile phone is nearer to the ear than to the mouth.

The words of Miranda, again from 'The Tempest', came to mind: "Oh brave new world, that has such people in't." She did not mean that the world she saw was courageous but, rather, admirable and splendid. Once again, I was thinking of the opposite. There's nothing admirable or splendid in seeing and hearing two people talking, during a lunch break from their office routine while completely ignoring each other. Perhaps they were suffering from another symptom of Generation Me.

When I took my cup and saucer back inside and handed it to one of the ever-smiling Italian ladies who run the café, I commented on what I had just seen. She wasn't at all surprised. She told of customers who continue talking on their mobile phones while she serves them at the counter. People sometimes do this while they are being served at the check-out counter of the supermarket next door. Whatever happened to politeness? How impenetrable can personal space become?

Along the footpaths in any part of the shopping centre, you can see, hear and encounter people busily shouting into their mobile phones. Indeed, they might actually bump into you. Or you might turn round to reciprocate the greeting when you hear someone behind you exclaim "Hello!", only to find that the person is talking to an invisible friend.

Let's share our personal space, nurturing face-to-face conversation with real people, while we can still do it.

© Copyright Brian Barratt 2009