Concerts and Snapchat

While I was in Mexico during Spring Break this past week, I met some new friends who were from Oklahoma.  We all got to talking and somehow ended up talking about the best concerts we had gone to.  Being an avid concert goer, I listed several I had gone to and the ones I especially enjoyed.  But then I thought about all the videos and pictures I had taken on my phone, but were no longer on it because they were taking up too much room.  I had downloaded them all to my computer and deleted them off my phone fairly soon after each concert.  So that got me thinking of why I took them to start with.  This situation would have been the perfect opportunity to show them to other people, but I didn’t have access to them at the time when I needed them.  When else was I actually going to use them?  I haven’t personally ever gone back to re-watch them ever, and even if I did, they were taken on my phone while we were all singing along in seats that were not front row, so the quality of the videos isn’t even all that great.

This goes back to the discussions we had earlier this semester about how we can either live in the moment, or record it for a later time.  Without a doubt, if you are taking a Snapchat video or picture at any event, you are missing the experience that is right in front of you.  Watching something through a small screen in front of you is simply not the same as whatever event you are attending.  Yet, even knowing this, I and many others, continue to do it constantly.  And it can become exhausting, because you’re always holding your phone up to hopefully get the best view and best video you can.  But instead, we should really be trying to enjoy the current environment.  This is all easier said than done, but as technology continues to improve and social media becomes an even bigger part of everybody’s lives, it will continue to get worse.

Thinking back on all the concerts I’ve gone to, there is not one that I didn’t pull my phone out to take pictures or videos.  Of course everyone wants to “remember the event” and pictures and videos are a great way of doing that.  But sometimes it becomes excessive, and I know I’m just as guilty of it as anyone else.  But reflecting back on all these times, I kind of wish I hadn’t been watching it through my little screen.  I probably missed lots of details that I would have seen if I had been watching the performance directly.  So going forward, I hope to enjoy things in the moment, and not always through a camera lens.  It won’t be easy, but I think it will be a good goal to work towards.  I got a little taste of it while I was in Mexico.  I only had a wifi connection, and even that wasn’t very strong or good.  So none of my social media would load and Snapchat was so slow.  So I decided to not worry about social media for most of the trip and I felt so much more relaxed because I didn’t feel the need to respond to everyone right away.