Unless you are frequently in the company of people who don't have any long-term memory, I'm probably the least nostalgic person you've ever met.
I like history well enough, but since I'm pretty sure I learned from it, I don't really feel the need to repeat it.
Before we judge too harshly, let's remember the "good old days" for me started with the Vietnam War and civil rights protests, proceeded briskly through Watergate and included the Iran Hostage crisis, a couple of not-so-great Depressions, leisure suits and perms for men.
Someone told me the other day disco was making a comeback and I had to stop and ask, really, just how long does a generation have to suffer for the mistakes of its youth?
In fact, when it comes to nostalgia, I'm pretty much heading, briskly, in the other direction. I want to know when those cool flying cars and robot maids the Jetsons promised us show up, and how soon I can book my vacation to the moon.
I don't mind that I can send messages, watch movies, check my calendar, play video games and update my status (whatever that means) on my phone. Now, if I can just figure out how to make a call on it, that would really be nice.
I'm personally looking forward to self-driving cars. In fact, I'd kind of like to be sitting there when our self-driving auto tells someone, who may or may not be my wife, "since only one of us can steer at at time and I have the wheel, how about we let it be me?"
Just about every day I come across some new thing I don't have to do any more that I used to have to do and hated. Write out and mail bills. Watch one of only three channels. Walk five miles to school in the snow, uphill both ways (OK, I never did that. And, probably neither did anyone else, despite what they may tell you).
But there is a big old King Daddy of things I'm glad I get to skip now, and I, for one, couldn't be happier.
I haven't been to the Revenue Office since Bush was president. Either one.
Yes, thanks to the miracles of modern technology and desire of at least one governor to get re-elected, you can renew your car tags and vehicle registration online. Heck, you can even do it on your phone in between games of Candy Crush and updating your fantasy football team.
And it takes just seconds. Or it does as soon as you tear the house up looking for the notification that has not one but two super-secret numbers you have to have, mis-enter one of them (the curse of normally-sized thumbs), try to locate your wallet, try to read your debit card number, rip apart a perfectly good chair when you drop your debit card between the arm and the seat cushion, realize the charge is being denied because you're actually entering the numbers off your library card, finally get and then accidentally delete the confirmation number and wait five days for the sticker .
Now this may, at times, seem daunting. But you've got to remember there is a carrot-and-stick quality to renewing your tags online. Yes, a trip to the office allows you to appreciate the visual magic of light on beige walls or the excitement of seeing what digits you get when you're asked to take number.
But now that folks can re-up online, the only people getting their tags renewed in person typically either lack a firm grasp of the sort of documentation actually needed to operate a car, or are trying to tag their Armored Personal Carrier. And chances are you're behind either or both of them. Which is guaranteed to make for a long afternoon.
So while I'm not too crazy about the hours it seems to take to download a movie or still haven't figured out all the nuances of Bluetooth (like, why anyone would call it that?), I am more than happy time has marched on, and that some of the features of that march are actually things I want and can use.
Besides, gives me more time to scope out all the neat places I'll be able to park that flying car.
GARY SMITH IS A RECOVERING JOURNALIST LIVING IN ROGERS.
Commentary on 09/18/2014