Peace on Earth
by Rose Mary Boehm


You’ve just switched from this old
cell phone you were feeling
increasingly ashamed of to the latest
in smartphones. You had to print
out the manual, a PDF of 148 pages
which ate your last color-printer cartridges.
On Christmas Day, of course.
The paper got stuck about
five times. They gave you a new
telephone number but since
you don’t know how to use
the thing you may as well be
disconnected from the world.
Even the new e-mail system is
not something for the faint hearted,
and your fingers are too fat for
the tiny keyboard. That’s when
you begin to know you’re back
where you should have been
before you learned how to use
your first IBM-clone which cost
you two arms and at least four legs
and was, with its 20 Mega hard-disk
the most awesome device ever
invented for six thousand dollars.

You remember how you rolled on
that new office carpet in frustration
wondering how to switch the infernal machine on.

You suddenly realize
you'll soon be reading that manual.






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