That's Entertainment

Last night, our family went to see the new Harry Potter flick. We enjoyed ourselves. It was a pretty good movie. I have not really read many of the books, and it had been a while since the kids had read them, but it was enjoyable nonetheless. Apparently, the scene with the Weasley's house being set on fire by the very unappealing Helena Bonham Carter was not in the book, but it certainly gave Mr. Potter an occasion to demonstrate his growing affection for Ginny Weasley.

There was a bit of a blip at the beginning of our night out. The promos began running only to abruptly end. The show was supposed to start at 6:30, but it was close to 7:00 when it did. Needless to say, the Potter fans were getting restless. While we waited, two of my family members played video games with their tiny devices of various kind. I have a cell phone, it does have game functions, but I don't use them.

As I sat and watched the game players watch minute images on the screen, I had to wonder at our fascination with entertainment. It has reached a point where we can't even sit and wait for twenty minutes without demanding that we be entertained. I think that entertainment of that variety, rather mindless, brief attention span kind of thing, perpetuates a demand for more of the same, so in general, I don't view it as a positive thing. There we were, a family out or a night of entertainment. The movie was going to be the entertainment, yet we couldn't even sit and wait without expecting to be entertained.

In the past few days, I have spent a lot of time waiting; first two days of hospital waiting rooms, then 30 minutes in the car waiting for my son yesterday afternoon. During those times, I either read a book or just sat and thought. My mother-in-law came with us to the hospital both days, and she didn't even bring a book. I'm sure she was left with her thoughts. Times like those, times of waiting, are invaluable for just pondering. A few minutes' entertainment with a mindless game could provide a relief, but it seems to be the bulk of what we do. Now, with cell phones that get internet service, one can be entertained with news, information. We do love to be entertained by information.

I often wonder what this solitary kind of activity does to human interaction. Are we beginning to lose our ability to converse with one another? Are we finding it difficult to keep up a conversation on one topic for more than five minutes? Do we want our personal relationships in bite sized pieces, too? Whatever happened to Crossword puzzles? How about Tic-tac-toe? Or twenty questions? Does anyone play twenty questions any more?

I enjoy being entertained. I was entertained during the movie. But after being entertained, I do desire to return to other kinds of thought. And I do like to have meaningful conversation. Sometimes, in this cell phone driven world we live in, that isn't always easy to find.