Time to reflect

Two weeks ago I was camping  in the middle of nowhere in La France. An old friend from Holland started the site 15 years ago. His dream was to create a refuge from the modern world. A place without almost anything, except the most basic things like 2 showers and 3 toilets and 1 fridge for all the visitors (mostly around 50 -70 people).

I hadn’t visited the ‘aire naturelle’ for 5 years. The only thing he added in these 5 years were two extra sockets near the fridge. They were all used to recharge iphones and iPads. And there was a waiting list.

I spoke with a man with an iPad, who told me he drove every morning to a nearby village to plug in and check the news and his mail. Screens are everywhere. Access as well. Even in the middle of nowhere (in Europe, that is).

I’m happy to say I did not carry a screen. Even more happier to say I did not read one single newspaper. Instead I read a few books. Very handy mobile media, I must say. I read a novel about the magic of books and Barcelona, finally finished ‘Outliers’ and worked my way through Friedman’s Green Bible.

And I had plenty of time to think. I came to feel, understand and notice the effect of media usage. Instead of browsing and flipping from blogs to posts and tweets, I actually enjoyed the time to reflect.