Chapter 2- pp.20
Close to Home
1. Some people can never get away from work these days. They’re at the
2. constant mercy of their cell phones, pagers, two-way radios, or other electronic
3. devices. Take my sister Cindy. When it comes to high-tech gadgets, she was
4. ahead of her time. Twenty years ago her business phone rang at home and an
5. ever-present walkie-talkie was there to provide access and communication
6. among her husband, herself, and the truck drivers in their small business. Her
7. husband was one of the first people I knew with a cell phone, back when they
8. were known as “car phones” because they didn’t detach from the car.
9. Cindy recalls attending her kinds’ soccer games with an oversized walkie-
10. talkie in hand, so she could conduct business, if necessary. Today, the company
11. is equipped with cell phones, two-way radios, and all-in-one radio and
12. telephone sets. But the business line still rights at home, which can be good or
13. bad, “Having it forwarded to the house makes it flexible because you don’t have
14. to be at the office to answer the phone,” Cindy said. “The drawback is you can’t
15. ever get away from the phone. You sort of live your business all the time. It’s
16. there at home with you.”
17. This modern conflict of work and home affects many people. It’s no longer
18. just business owners or professionals such as doctors who are at the beck and
19. call of their livelihood; even the average employee finds it difficult to get away
20. from work sometimes. Pagers, cell phones, and other devices can be a mixed
21. blessing, providing access and efficiency, yet at the same time, inconvenience
and
22. interruption of family life and personal time.
23. This phenomenon has been explored extensively by Maggie Jackson, a
24. columnist and author of What’s Happening to Home: Balancing Work, Life and
Refuge in the
25. information Age. The New York resident, who worked as a reporter for the New
26. York Time and the Boston Globe, said that technology is redefining home life and
27. blurring the boundaries between work and home. With the explosion of hi-tech
28. devices such as cell phones and PDAs, or personal digital assistants, she said,
29. “The march of technology into our lives is unstoppable.”
30. While viewing technological development as a gift, Jackson warns that it
31. may require sacrifice as well. Mobile technology is turning homes into
32. workplaces, she said, citing the popularity of the computer armoire and a
33. modern sofa that make it easier to bring work into the living room. In coming
34. decades, she predicts that the lines between work and home will be even
35.dimmer, and people won’t feel a need to hide their computers in fancy furniture.
36. Jackson reports that 70 percent of all employees must be accessible to their
37. jobs during off-hours and says that technology chipping away at weekend and
38. vacation time. “It changes the parameters of a worker’s private time,” she said.
39. In addition, domestic life has moved from the home and neighborhood into the
40. workplace, she said, noting that employees may eat, socialize, and even work our
41. at the company. From work, parents may instant-message their children or
42. connect with latch-key kids via telephone or personal cell phone. Jackson says
43. that 60 million people bring their cell phones to work each day. Some children
44. even fax homework and report cards to Mom or Dad to check at the office.
45. “Home and work are becoming truly portable,” Jackson said.
46. The sacrifices and costs of losing what have been boundaries between work
47. and home include a lack of refuge in the home and loss of private life. Jackson
48. advocates employer respect for the personal life of workers and commends
49. companies like Ernst & Young for making efforts to protect that privacy and
50. limit the on-call time of employees. Other drawbacks to the expansion of
51. technology include the loneliness and distance of virtual relationships, which
52. can give people the feeling of being together when they are actually apart.
53. “The proliferation of mobile technology is affecting the way we relate to
54. each other,” said Jackson, who discussed parents who instant-message their
55. children to come down to dinner rather than shouting upstairs and those who
56. read bedtime books to children over the telephone while on a business trip. She
57.sasid that friends might use technology as a new form of togetherness by carrying
58.out their relationships via technology. “Face to face togetherness is the old
59. standard,” she said. “Families are now portable, too.” High-tech devices also
60. can invade the privacy of others when they interrupt performances, business
61. meetings, or dinner conversations, Jackson said.
62. So, what can be done about this technological invasion? Do we try to
63. squelch it, live with it, or just find the right balance? We may find a clue in
64. Jackson’s depiction of a transition of the past. She said that when the Industrial
65. Age gave way to the computer age, many people worried that the new devices
66. would overtake their old way of life. And one wise observer summed their fears
67. up when he warned people: “Be sure that we control these gadgets and not the
68. other way around.” That’s not bad advice for today, either.
