My ancient iPad is an exasperating machine. Try Googling; it has a too-vigorous spell-checker. It transforms words into nonsensical antonyms, or, at best, pop culture references I do not know.
It also has difficulty loading email. Loading…loading…loading…. Some days the e-mail does not come through. It does not share the post office motto: “Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.”
It could be worse. It would be worse with a phone. People bow their heads in reverence to their phones. I do not revere my tablet. They walk while they text, read, or play Scrabble. They don’t seem to fall down, thank goodness. Drivers recklessly text as they drive. They do have accidents. And all of us suffer from “text neck,” formerly knows as “dowager hump.”
My husband’s phone has a strict spell-check program which cannot be turned off. It changes the names of our cats, Dulcie and Polly, to Dulcimer and Pollyanna.
Should we knuckle under and change their names?
“Dulcimer! Pollyanna!”
They stare.
Lately the iPad has reached a crossroads. To text or not to text? It refuses to text. There is no text function.
“Can’t be done. I don’t text,” I say.
I know the limits of the iPad. I love not texting or receiving texts. Occasionally I give the iPad a break by turning it off. You push a virtual slide from one side of the screen to the other. But is it actually off?
The ways of the ancient iPad are mysterious.