A stressful day in the high-tech life

For those not mechanically inclined, living in a high-tech world with an increasing number of complicated contrivances can be very stressful.

Several months ago, I had a day that pushed me to the limits of my abilities to handle stress. I thought hearing about it might serve those of you who believe in the adage “misery loves company.”

The day began late when a thunderstorm during the night gave the alarm clocks a 30-minute breather and produced a breathless, frantic pace in our household to get everyone off to their appointed rounds.

Another challenge awaited me at the office. The phones were out because of the same storm. I attempted to remain calm, cool and collected, attending to tasks that did not require outside communication. But I quickly found that most of my day’s priorities centered around the need to reach out and touch someone.

When I proceeded to my trusty automobile, destination hospital, I found a dead battery thwarted that decision. After borrowing a colleague’s car, I made it to my meeting only a few minutes late. Relief set in as I regained what turned out to be a false sense of security and control in my life.

Having promised a colleague I would take him to lunch, I discovered one of my children had stripped my wallet of the cash needed for their lunch and gasoline. Not to be outdone, I headed for a supermarket and an automated teller machine.

You can guess my reaction when a sign indicated the machine was being repaired. Nevertheless, I struggled through lunch with a minimum of embarrassment produced by the good-natured ribbing of my luncheon appointment and headed back to the office.

The next hurdle was looming ahead. With the phone in operation, I called the supplier of a badly needed order of test materials. I was informed the supplier’s computers were down and he could not check on my order at that time.

Feeling downright paranoid about my relationship with mechanical things, I decided the best thing for me to do was settle in for a series of counseling sessions. With a nice fire in the fireplace, I anticipated working with and helping people – the name of the game in my profession.

Suddenly all hell broke loose as the fire alarm went off in the response to a smoke alarm from a fireplace in another part of the building, caused by a closed damper.

On the way home I begin to envision life on a desert island, in a thatched hut, with no automobiles, alarm clocks, money dispensers or fire alarms.

Because I consider going home at the end of the day to a happy, peaceful family the solution to most problems, I breathed a sigh of relief and looked forward to a good dinner and a good book for the evening. Upon entering the house, I immediately surmised that something was amiss.

A glance at the look on my wife’s face led to the discovery that the heating element in the clothes dryer had burned out, leaving her with her own anger toward mechanical conveniences.

I suppose the moral of this story is those who live by high-tech suffer from high-tech. We finished the day in a family discussion of what it must have been like 100 years ago when the concern for sick horses, scrub boards and drafty homes might have been the chief complaints of the day.

As I turned on my electric blanket and drifted off to sleep, I thanked the Almighty for a new day and the finish of one that in retrospect contained only minor problems compared to those many people in the world face today.

Harold H. LeCrone, Jr., Ph.D. Copyright 1987