on being among the last generation to not have internet during childhood

I was born in 1990. I remember my family getting our first computer when I was 6 or 7. It was gigantic, ran Windows 95, and you had the option of starting it up in DOS. We didn't have the internet - I mainly used the computer to write stories on Microsoft Word, paint in Paint, and to play Pac Man. 

Then, in primary school, when we moved to the suburbs from Scarborough (east Toronto), we got The Internet. I don't remember the exact moment we acquired it, but I remember it quickly became a big part of my life. I remember waiting for it to dial up (I can hear the sound in my head right now), and needing to ask mom and dad if I could use it in case they were expecting any important phone calls. If I wanted to download anything I had to do it over dinner when they didn't want to receive any phone calls anyhow. 

I remember using it for MSN (a messaging platform from back in the day). I remember running home from school in grade 7 and 8 to chat with my friends, and to live my life on there, free from the prying eyes of teachers and parents. 

My first email address was broken_beyond_repair02@hotmail.com. Yeah, I was that angsty.

My parents were practically Luddites, so we were never a very technologically advanced family. To give you an idea, I didn't get my first cell phone until after graduating high school at 18, and I didn't get my first smartphone, with internet access/data (a used iPhone 4 S which I still use to this day, thank you very much) until 2016. 

I'm not going to sit here and tell you that the internet ruined my life, or that it has ruined life in general. Since you're here with me, I'd hazard that you already understand the benefits - the democratization of knowledge (especially with websites for free learning like Khan Academy or Coursera); social media to connect with family and friends who we wouldn't ordinarily be able to be in close contact with (shout out to my fam in Australia, who I have on What's App!); making more things more accessible to people with disabilities; the mobilization and amplification of a variety of marginalized viewpoints that would not otherwise have platforms; hell, there are even examples of social media being used to organize and mobilize revolutionary and rescue initiatives. 

I'm also not going to sit here and tell you that the internet hasn't ruined aspects of [my] life. I spend wayyyyy too much time on social media wasting my dwindling hours endlessly scrolling through shit I don't care about when I could be doing literally anything else; it makes me compare myself to others (to my endless pointless suffering); it makes me feel like I'm missing out on things all the time; it mobilizes and amplifies a lot of hateful viewpoints and provides a platform for hate groups to organize; it spreads a lot of misinformation; there's the idea of omniscience fatigue wherein we are so overloaded with instantly-accessible information that information itself becomes boring, etc. etc. etc. 

I remember my pre-internet brain. I remember playing with my friends in elementary school in the school yard, sans phones, sans internet, pretending that we were witches or the Spice Girls and going on crazy adventures while hopping over snowbanks. I remember needing to go to the library and look at books to do school projects. I remember teachers needing to ask if we had computer/internet access at home. I remember hanging out with my cousins with all the kids on their street, and stringing all of our toy cars and anything with wheels to the backs of our bicycles, putting barbies and beanie babies in them, and racing down the street, trying our best to make the toys fall out on a sharp turn. I remember making people out of pipecleaners, attaching them to plastic bag parachutes, and chucking them out the second-story window. I remember being excited to play lego and creating elaborate circuses with roller coasters and rides.

Not that this stuff doesn't happen with kids these days, of course. But I think that all of that wholesome, non-screen-related play and discovery is important to development. And back then, it wasn't an option. It was all we had. The negative implications for screen time on attention span, obesity, cardiovascular health, etc. are well documented. I don't want to be one of those old-timers who hearkens back to the glory days before invention X or Y, but I guess that's what I'm doing.

I think that my generation is unique in being among the few that straddles the Great Internet Divide (I'm calling it that, deal with it). I remember my pre-internet brain, and I didn't have the internet during many of my formative years. At the risk of sounding prideful, I'm pretty grateful for that. I think that I have a greater appreciation of nature, of face to face conversation, of creating art, of sticking my hands in the dirt, of the value of imagination and story-telling. All of this is of course anecdotal - I'm sure there are lots of folks born after the mid 90s who can lay definitive claim to these attributes as well. But I can't help but wonder if there's something inherently different about those of us who grew up without the internet, compared to those who cannot remember a childhood that was internet-free. 

I think even more jarring is the fact that we grew up in some of our most formative years without the internet, and then, boom, there it was. We were very lucky to have grown up along with it - it makes it far easier to understand technology and to be able to carve a worthy place out in the modern technologized world. I'm glad to have had my years as a young tot internet-free, and I'm also glad to have been able to learn how to live in this internet-laden world as I grew up. It's pretty much a win-win in my books.

I think this developmental history, wherein formative years of my childhood were internet-free, and my preteen years onward were internet-saturated, creates a strange neither-here-nor-there-ness in my identity. Unlike kids who grew up only knowing the internet, I feel like I long for my pre-internet brain. I'm nostalgic for it. More was a mystery in the world, I didn't feel bogged down with every single tragedy, and I didn't feel addicted to something that (like every addictive thing) both giveth and taketh away. People who grew up only ever knowing the internet may understand and appreciate its destructive potential, but they can't yearn for a life that existed previous to it, not having known it at all. At the same time, I am also so grateful to live in this time where information and viewpoints are so accessible, where I can be so connected with others, where I have access to so much. 

I don't think I would give this up if I could, and still part of me wishes that I never had access to any of this in the first place. Much of the inner workings of my mind include coming to terms with conflicting aspects of my identity. (Examples here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.) This, it seems, is no exception.