A Broken Promise

A short piece of fiction about our relationship to a connected world.

March 1989

The big red switch made a satisfying “klunk” when you turned it on. The heavy monitor displayed a single color: orange. Although a wheel under the screen did let you adjust the brightness and boldness. The system whirred to life, and in a few moments it waited for human input.

C:\> |

I stared at the blinking cursor. There was something magic about this new addition to our home — like if I could figure out how to use it, I could do anything. Not understanding it filled me with a vague yearning desire.

All I could think to do was type nonsense on the heavy, clacky keys.

C:\> vnuhpowemflksdjv;jdopfiqwj|

A new line of orange text appeared:

C:\> BAD COMMAND OR FILE NAME

There was one thing I knew how to do. My key mashing and daydreaming only delayed the inevitable.

With my two pointer fingers, I pecked:

C:\>CD\games

I hit enter and considered my options. The computer had only a small handful of installed games. Hangman, golf, blackjack, Wheel of Fortune, Battleship, and Pac Man.

Pac Man was a rudimentary version of the game — much less exciting than the arcade. Pac Man himself was a flat rectangle face, like a child’s drawing. He slid across the screen, not animated in any real way. Eating the pellets or the ghosts looked more like absorbing them.

I knew games could be better than this, but that wasn’t the point. The computer held a strange and mysterious power over me. Not a toy. A powerful tool. One I could use to do something real. Something amazing.

If only I knew how.

I typed:

C:\games\golf.exe

Sigh.

I hit enter.

May 1999

The mechanical screeching sounds stopped. A small pop up on the bottom right hand corner of the Windows 98 machine let me know I was connected.

So much felt like it had led to this moment. I learned how to type at school. I was very fast, even somewhat accurate.

We kept that old DOS based machine well beyond its expiration date. No one had substantially used it in ages, but I ocassionally booted it up, hoping to unlock new secrets.

My true achievements on it were easy to list. By the time I was seven, I knew the rules of blackjack and golf. And I could navigate a command-line-based operating system.

But finally, it stood in front of me: a computer with a proper operating system, connected to the internet. I ached to discover the magic I knew existed out there. I could learn or see anything. Talk to people from anywhere.

With no idea where to start, I stared at the screen and tried to imageine the kind of life I was about to start living.

June 2025

I close my work laptop at 5:38 pm. I’ve worked remotely for half a decade. The number of times I’d seen my coworkers in person during this time teeters on the edge of double digits.

Standing up, I’m reminded of how little I’ve moved. Stiff. Somehow exhausted.

I stare out a window for a moment, and then amble to the couch and wake up the smart TV. I put something on I’ve already seen, which doesn’t scratch the itch I seem to have.

With the TV still on, I pull my phone out of my pocket and scroll. Looking for something.