Stop! Do NOT follow directions!

Following Directions?  That is so 1950’s!

We went to school in the era of workbooks and following directions.  “Do not start your work until you have read ALL the directions, children!”  “Janice, do I see you starting your work without reading EVERYTHING?”

So is it any wonder I must slog through the entire 5 lb. “Photoshop for Dummies” book I asked my husband to give me for Christmas before I even open the program?

And those computer games!  Where are the instructions?  It doesn’t help that some of the games I am attracted to are ones wherein you must search around for the hidden objects, open secret doors and try using tools you have collected to get in deeper.  Those games are made for people who did not have the arched eyebrow of Miss Hokensen, my second grade teacher, looking at them.  They can be so frustrating.

However, these are very games that promote using computers and cell phones.  Just jump in and start clicking, urge the games!  We mid-lifers worry that we will push some button that will launch the nuclear weapons of mass computer destruction.

After playing a few of these games, I was more inclined to try clicking around my new computer programs, and voila!  I actually was able to move to a higher “level”.  Societies of every ilk have had games and pastimes that promoted valuable skills.  Shooting arrows at rolling hoops, marksmanship skills, sewing doll clothes, rodeos for cowboys, macramé for sailors, lemonade stands for future entrepreneurs.  And now computer games encourage us to start clicking.

But I’m not giving up my “…for Dummies” books.  Nor my archaic ability to write cursive and add a column of numbers in my head, for that matter.  You never know when I might need to cut out a construction paper Valentine and send it to a math major.  Such as my husband.