The Real Matrix

We may not be able to dodge bullets or jump over tall buildings, but let me assure you that all of us are certainly plugged in. "What are we plugged into?" you wonder. We are plugged into the virtual world that only exists in the language of 1s, 0s, and crazy radio waves all around our domes. You see, while our most hip and current cinematic hero Neo is plugged into the Matrix through a steel plug in his head, our Matrix is only a few years away from being just as extreme. Whether it's through a cellphone or a computer, we're all plugged in, and there's no turning back now.

Look around you as you walk out of class. Before the lecturer even lets the class out, people have taken out their cellphones in order to plug in as quickly as possible. I can't help but wonder: "who is calling you between 10:25 and 11:40 on a Tuesday morning?" Furthermore, what is so important that you've got to know about it before you even make it out of the building?

Between classes up on the Quad, you can see all the people, all the mindless bodies, just transporting brains that are plugged into the phone. See, before cellphones were so widespread, you could see a person walking towards you and know just where they were; they were there. Their body and brain walked together in harmony, both in touch with the reality of the current surroundings.

Now, though, when you see a person walking and plugged into the phone, you just have no clue where their brain is. Their consciousness has been snatched away from the Quad and beamed on the airwaves, up to a cell tower, up to a satellite, and then back down to Earth somewhere in Westchester. Their consciousness is having a fight with a high school boyfriend!

If the cellphone is our mobile portal to the Matrix, then we have also been successful at proliferating stations for easy plug-in. Computers. We've got computers in our rooms, in our houses, in the Campus Center. They are everywhere. As if the cellphone hadn't taken us away from reality enough, we now can fully seclude ourselves in front of a screen to plug into whatever may be going on in the Matrix.

I believe there was a time when the first time people interacted in the morning was with an exchange of "good morning." As in, two humans would see each other face-to-face, and talk. Now, though, I think that all of us go through plenty of communication before we actually speak outloud. Something about this doesn't jive with me. Before we have cleared the shiz from our eyes in the morning we check to see who has left us IM's over night. Since the term is so commonplace now, it's important to think about the concept of IM: Instant. Message. Instant. This technology was designed to put people in touch instantly who are across the globe from one another.

Or, in many cases, across the hall.

In our world of the information superstructure that is the Matrix, our brains are instantly hotwired to other brains, completely skipping the steps of talking, listening, and giving each other "the pound." Now, however, we are so used to the Instant Message that it no longer needs to be instant, and we are content to leave people a message for when they wake up.

See, another part of the Instant Messenger technology is the Away Message. The Away Message is the way that people maintain a brain-presence in the Matrix when they are 'Away' from it. In other words, as our bodies sleep, we have proxied our brains to the Matrix by telling all the other brains, "I'm sleeping." But the other brains don't mind; they'll just leave you a message. For when you wake up. This means that when you wake up the next day, instead of saying "good morning" to your roommate you can catch up to what your Matrixed Substitute Brain was up to all night.

When things don't need to be Instant, though, we can always turn to e-mail. Again, it is virtually (no pun intended) impossible to imagine the world before e-mail. E-mail stands for electronic mail. Our brain dictates thoughts into 1s and 0s which are instantly transmitted God-knows-how, to wait in the mailbox of another brain. How many times a day do you check your email? Don't count. You'll only hang yourself. Because you plug in as often as possible. You've got to be updated.

There once were havens for us humans that kept us out of the Matrix, unable to plug in. We actually spent time letting our consciousness reside in the same place as our bodies. But it seems that each oasis has been infiltrated. Class: you can get a text message. Sleeping: your IM collects messages for your sleeping brain. Eating: your phone vibrates to signal the arrival of someone's brain that wants to talk to you. On the toilet: wireless internet has no bounds.

The Matrix has got us. Everyday life is not enough to contain our heads, and so we set up as many ways as possible to collect more information. As you sit in the back of a lecture hall trying to stay awake, your cell phone collects voicemails, your e-mail box is getting stuffed, and your Buddies are bombarding you Instantly, awaiting your return. You watch the clock tick, and you know that as soon as the final minute passes, you will plug the phone into your head. You must connect. As soon as you can. To the Matrix.