The call came early, as I was wiping the sleep from my eyes.
“I need help!” my sister’s voice was laced with excitement and concern.
I could hear meowing in the background. Twelve hours prior, she’d taken in an orphaned kitten.
The kitten’s eyes were open and she seemed healthy, but she didn’t want dry food.
I offered her advice from our experience with orphans over the years: offer formula (it’s expensive, so get the powder— it keeps in the freezer if you don’t use it all), use an eye dropper if she doesn’t understand the bottle nipple, try softening the food, mimic what her mama would have done, etc.
And then my sister said something that caught my attention:
“It’s so reassuring to talk to someone who can share actual advice. I Googled this for 15 minutes, but everything I found was generic and vague.”
Ding. Ding. Ding.
We live in the Age of Information and part of me loves it. As a child of the Nineties, I remember craving info on various obscure topics, yet always coming up short.
Our trusty set of Child Craft encyclopedias only went so far, and if the library didn’t have the right books, there were no other options.
When my parents hooked our dinosaur of a computer to dial-up internet for the first time, I was enamored.
Even though the world wide web of 1998 was nowhere as vast as it is today, it was a portal of magical information and connection I’d never had before.
But as our Information Age has matured, it seems as though the information is a little less…. informative?
Have you noticed this?
Back in my early days of blogging (circa 2010ish), a quick search would point to dozens of personal websites where folks would share real life observations and instructions.
But now? The search results are filled with generic, sterile websites that parrot the same stale facts over and over.
It’s generic. Flimsy. Pointless.
It’s advice from people (or robots…) who’ve never actually tried the things they write about… they’re simply jockeying for search traffic to boost their ad revenue.
And so, I find myself reaching for old-fashioned sources of information once again:
Folks with proven, real life experience.
People doing DEEP thinking.
Those who’ve LIVED it, not just tried it once.
Older, time-honored books and writers.
Podcasts that go off the beaten path, instead of interviewing the same celebrities about the same topics.
Because the cost of cheap information is that we end up with very little real information at all.
And as old-fashioned people, we get to once again reach back to the past and find the good stuff.
I’m up for the challenge– are you?
Digging for the Good Stuff,
-Jill
P.S. The kitten is doing great. 🙂
Sue says
As a Child of the 50s we could always go to parents or grandparents for practical info. They survived the Great Depression for goodness sake! My mom grew up on a farm in New England and my dad was from a small German community in NYC. Sounds like a bonus, right? Grandmothers gone when I was 6 but I still looked to that generation for down to earth info.
Jane Smelt says
Thanks Jill, you have just articulated what I have felt for some time. I love the internet and use it a lot, but at the end of the day, it is real people, with heart, soul, spirit and pain in the pilgrimage that make the best teachers. Now I am older I find I am looked to sometimes for advice (which is a bit scary) and I’m always delighted to help if I can. Keep up the great conversations – I love your page on FB. Greetings from the middle of nowhere in NZ.
Alison says
I think this is so so true and so sad. And now with the rise of AI, you can’t even be sure of the books you are buying! I am always eternally grateful to the people who have taken the time to teach me what they know.
Katie says
Great post! We live on the Canadian prairies (much like your climate!) and attend a church of mostly 70+ yr. old folks. Most married 50+ years. I LOVE listening to their stories of growing up. So many stories of home remedies that worked. One elderly lady friend of ours is very robust and healthy. Her Dad dipped his kids in a barrel of icy cold water on a regular basis while Mom stood by w/ a towel to wrap them up and take them in where it was warm. She also regularly drinks a strong tea made w/ garlic, lemon juice, lemon peel and something else. I’ve been meaning to take a notebook to church and actually write this stuff down in detail. We also have a large immigrant population who bring their own home remedies from their mother countries and that’s so much fun to learn, too! Linden flower tea for strengthening lungs, black winter radishes w/ honey for cough syrup. Very cool.
I’m reading Old-Fashioned On Purpose. Good job. I like it a lot. As I was reading today I thought I should highly recommend a book for you to read: The Invisible Rainbow by Arthur Firstenberg. My husband says it’s one of the more life-changing important books he has read. I plan to read it when he’s done.