On Sunday, I was sitting in Stanstead airport, delayed, and annoyed. I was only there because my Heathrow flight with BA was cancelled due to the strike, and all my plans had to be changed. So I started to wonder what would happen if I said I no longer wanted to fly, ever, anywhere. Like the old days. If it means crossing water, I'll get a boat.
While I'm following this train of thought, how about I throw out my mobile phone too. Just travel the world with a pen and paper, on a boat.
I've often thought about this. The stories my old teacher Ruggiero Ricci used to tell, of learning to play the 5th caprice of Paganini, backwards, or of learning left hand pizzicato because it was the only technique he could practice lying in bed, could only belong to a time without planes, high-speed trains, blackberries and, of course, TV. My generation has come of age, slightly awkwardly, during the exact time the internet took over the world. We didn't have computers as children, but have had to build careers and lives in an age which revolves around them completely.
I shall use mine to watch a movie on the plane, to keep up with emails, to skype with my 2 year old daughter when I arrive. A daughter who thinks I exist in two forms- in person and on a computer screen- neither particularly less odd than the other. She will grow up completely at one with the technology my parents are still fairly confused by.
But, this year, for the first time, we will take a holiday- a no-phone holiday, where the only criteria are flip-flops and a hat. And maybe I'll learn the 5th caprice, backwards.
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