Yes, this is another modem/Internet article.
In fact, without a modem and email access, it would never have got here at all.
As a former member of the SA Public Service, I thought I knew about being
invisible.
God knows they tried to shut me up and keep me out of trouble
(S/He probably got a good giggle out of it).
We don't exactly do good by
stealth in the public service, it's more like good by stubborn-ness; no
weight of budgets and rationalization can quite displace the belief
inherent in those two words: public service.
I hope it never will.
I think that was when I first got really excited about computers.
Some years back, via a PC-based
system called Optel, and providing all the equipment in all the different
places worked (!), I could teach Maths in several widely-scattered
locations at once.
Needless to say, the Mac-based Electronic Classroom
proved to be much more reliable and easier to use.
Not that I needed much convincing. From the old mainframes to the BBCs, Amstrads and clunky MS-DOS machines, I'd seen nothing to touch a late '70s HP programmable calculator for style and ease of use, until we got Macs at work.
My students, all of whom were even more isolated by serious learning barriers, each leapt at a Mac like a dolphin at a slice of raw fish.
Interesting, I thought.
Five years ago, I bought a Mac LC III, so I
could go on with work at home.
My just two-year-old 'helped' unpack.
I set
it up and turned it on, and she asked if she could use it.
"Sure" I said (her older brother had used a Microbee at the same age, with help), "Just wait till I get back from the toilet [this is a real-life article] and I'll get you into something."
The toilet, like a doctor's waiting room, is a place where you may have to
hang around even if there isn't anything to read; I was surprised not to
have 10-secondly toddler reminders voiced through the door.
"What is that
child doing?" I thought with all the trepidation of experienced parenthood.
By the time I came out, she was drawing in ClarisWorks 2.0.
The first words
she learnt to read (at two) were New, Open, Save, Print and Quit.
She's seven
now, has email penpals and spends literally hours writing, drawing,
exploring CDs, all known as "Just talking to Elsie" [now upgraded to Quadra].
"It's like magic," I thought, "Breaking the language and distance barrier like that!"
Strangely enough, after all these years of battling barriers for my students and clients, I've crossed another frontier by myself, my friend's modem at hand.
I could have used a starship crew, or at least Dr McCoy.
Despite previously being able to read, write and travel (not to mention talk and get into trouble), I became even more invisible than your average country person, by contracting CFIDS (Chronic Fatigue Immuno-Dysfunction Syndrome).
May 12th (I think) is our day, guys, look out for the blue ribbons where people are well enough to get out and wear them.
Anyway, four months in hospital had a lot in common with delays in the toilet, since I couldn't read or write, or concentrate for that matter.
Nowadays I'm bedridden and largely off the air.
Country disabled people are among the most invisible.
I am grateful to my
Disability Support Advocate, Ros Frazer in Berri, for telling me about the
Disability Information and Resource Centre (DIRC) BBS, 'Common Ground',
with some free 1800 time for country people in the evening
[disabled
people, their carers or advocates can register online at 1800 654416;
Adelaide residents please contact sysop David Wallace on 82807551].
It took me months to get as far as connecting, but thanks to that modem (and my Powerbook 140 [laptop], of course) I had a means of communication again.
I 'met' people with cerebral palsy, blind or deaf people, people who'd had strokes; and we were all equal, however slowly and inaccurately we typed, on Common Ground.
We had access to information, newsgroups, software, and to each other.
I've gorged myself on newsgroups (there really is something for everybody), I've cursed Netscape and Internet Explorer, and their makers and the makers' ancestors unto the fourth generation, like everyone else, but have been able to find a vast variety of information on the 'Net.
I've found software and discussion, and have ventured into IRC (Internet Relay Chat, live), but most of all, regardless of the pain and debility and whatever time of the day or night it might be, I am not alone.
Even if I can't get out of bed, can't move properly or hold a phone, can't form words to talk properly, and it's 2 am... I can wake up my laptop, goose the modem, and email or chat with a friend anywhere in the world.
There are so many wonderful people out there.
People with a common interest
or need will build networks and support each other.
Although some of your incoming email messages, from net-hyenas that prowl for email addresses anywhere, do make you wonder how widespread is the assumption that anyone with a modem needs help with their sex-life, or is a sucker for get-rich-quick schemes (? strrrraaange people), a modem is a gateway to adventure, a freedom of the city, a bridge that crosses all kinds of barriers.
Go on. Go where you've not gone before.
