Renaissance Redneck: It’s marvelous

By David Kittredge
By David Kittredge

A couple of years ago, a study was conducted in Ireland involving the idea that color projected from smartphone screens aided in the addiction of teenagers’ incessant use of the devices. The study found that after a five-day duration of using smartphones in the grayscale — or black and white mode — usage had dropped by nearly 30 percent. And although 70 percent of the students found the grayscale challenging, 74 percent reported better sleep and 52 percent of the participants reported having a better mood during the experiment. I suspect that these findings would be much the same for a vast cross section of society no matter the smart phone user’s age or demographic.

The problem in “curing” a child’s phone addiction in this way is that once a parent has enabled the grayscale function on the phone, the teenager could probably figure out how to re-enable the full color mode faster than you could say “Kim Kardashian.” So, the only obvious solution is for the parent to restrict phone usage to say, an hour a day to limit their twittering, sour-Facebooking and video carnage.

I recently met a family from the Midwest — River Falls, Wisconsin, to be exact, — at a friend’s house. My friend, in anticipation of her family’s arrival, had a bit of angst concerning their two young boys, aged 8 and 9. Would the children be out of control emotionally and physically? Would they be screeching at the top of their lungs while they raced around the house?

All fears of these scenarios were put at rest upon our greeting her family as they exited their motor home. The boys immediately walked up to me and proudly showed me an orange salamander they had caught on their trip from the Midwest, which was stored in a miniature terrarium, complete with moss, grasses, and three shiny copper pennies. While I asked them questions about their find, the boys, in a relaxed manner, answered me politely. The salamander was a gift that they wanted to deposit into the trout pond on the property. I could tell quickly that these boys had been raised properly, with love, discipline, and thoughtful oversight.

The children spent a lot of time outdoors, which is an anomaly in our times, I noticed that they had the “tools” to be able to play and entertain themselves quite handily. I remarked about this to the grandparents who then told me that the children were not allowed to play video games most of the time, except for a short period on rainy days or special occasions.

Even when two older cousins of the boys showed up the next day, the children played well together outside the house, for the most part racing around the spacious yard chasing each other, playing games or trying to catch crayfish on the edge of the pond.

Is there a direct correlation between the lack of electronic devices in children’s lives and their calm thoughtful demeanor? Is it Midwestern values of neighborliness and honesty instilled in the children by their parents? The family fortunately does have a large backyard for the children to play in back in Wisconsin and the whole family often ride trail bicycles together through the wooded paths back home.

In today’s world we are bombarded with a constant barrage of sensationalism, or even more to the point phenomenalism which is a condition where all events and personalities are lifted to the level of grandiose marvelousness in an effort to dazzle the eyes of the beholder. Children are easily caught up in this shallowed-dish environment and are being targeted for material gain by the perpetrators creating this false electronic aura surrounding retail goods, online personalities, and sports heroes.

Instead, let’s remember to instill a sense of wonderment by getting them outside the house away from all the electronic hocus-pocus to let them observe the natural marvels such as orange salamanders, crayfish and the like, while using all of their senses to learn, cope and understand.

David Kittredge is a regular contributor to The Eagle Times. You can send comments to him via the editor.