I have been hearing about all the wonders of the electronic age and have to agree with some of the advantages. I love e-mail and I also like the comfort of writing my articles and columns at home and sending them to the newspaper while I am still in my jammies and slippers. It's nice to get on Google to get information too new to be in the encyclopedia set we bought when our oldest child was in school. Getting a map to direct me right to the door of my destination saves several headaches, and ordering something from my desk is a convenience.

But I draw the line at being enchanted with all the possibilities in the music world. I have been reading lately how musicians and record companies are loosing out because everyone is copying music from various sources instead of buying records. That isn't my biggest concern.

My hair almost stands on end when I observe people of any age walking, running, sitting outside, driving a car, or gathered together in a room with earphones on their heads while nodding in time to the music. If we didn't know what was going on we might think that our population had been afflicted with some disease which causes the head to shake and show no response to the surroundings.

Two of our great-granddaughters can't wait until they get together. One will even drive to Joplin with me to pick up her little sister so they will be together longer. I used to make the trips down a time for one-on-one conversation, and the trips back home with the two girls together a chance to play some roadside games.

That doesn't happen anymore. Each girl has received some type of electronic music recording. The trip down is silent unless I turn on the car radio. Any conversation is not heard over the beat, beat, beat of whatever song is being played in her ear. When I have to be sure I am heard I must either yell very loudly or poke her to get her attention.

Then when the two get together they each clamp on their headphones and start nodding away, sometimes singing phrases with the song. At least that gives me a clue to what they are hearing and I don't have to worry that they have found something obscene.

I notice a ditch full of blooming day lilies and try to point them out to the girls. By the time I get their attention the flowers are two miles behind us.

We have a whole generation who are riding or walking through life without seeing or hearing anything except what comes to them through those earphones. Walkers in the park aren't listening to the birds or the other sounds of nature. They are tuned in to their earphones.

When our children were teens at home they played popular music on their stereos or record players. I sometimes got tired of hearing it, but at least I could share what they were listening to, and sometimes could get them to listen to some of my records. I also could talk to them above the sound of the music. I liked that better.

I know I am out of sync but I do realize that there might be a benefit to us Middle Age Plus folk. When we have obvious hearing aids and our heads shake a little from age or palsy maybe the kids will think we are really into the music scene and have some high powered new gadgets in our ears that are better than I-Pods or CDs.

I think they would be right.