Life grows more and more complicated

I’m not sure who’s to blame for this, but life’s gotten way too complicated, and it looks like it’s not going to get simpler any time soon.

Take the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell’s breakthrough 19th-century invention. It used to have a simple, rotary dial and all it did was make phone calls, no last-number redial, personalized ring tones, text messaging, calendar and scheduler, built in camera or Web-browser. It was just a phone, not a “personal digital assistant.” It was as easy-to-use and reliable as two tin cans and a piece of string.

But that was then.

Where once we were content with a tool for each task – a telephone, a toaster, a can opener, a television – the geniuses who run the electronics world are figuring out this very minute how they can combine them altogether into one very tiny Swiss-Army-knife type of battery-and-internet-powered gadget that does absolutely nothing – unless you pay a monthly subscription for each service.

First you’ll pay the low introductory price just to get a bill with your name on it, then $9.95 monthly if you want the can opener available 24/7, $5.95 additional for all the toast you can make and, if you want to watch the television, there’ll be another charge based on whether you want sports, soaps or the news.

If that’s all too complicated, there’s sure to be a one-price, unlimited-use plan for those who don’t want to figure out how all the other plans work. But even if you don’t want to watch TV on your toaster, the fact that you could is what’ll make it “cool” to own one of these beauties. Never mind it’ll only toast a 1/16 inch square slice of bread (measured diagonally), because next year’s model will be sure to double that and they’ve got a roadmap to reach 1 inch by 2012.

And speaking of convergence, someday we’ll vote electronically, just like we do today on television’s “American Idol.” Just imagine a TV-based primary process where tens of millions of Americans tune in each week to watch 24 contestants posture and preen, then use their cell phones to cast votes for their favorite until the final “results show.” It might encourage perennial political gadfly Ralph Nader to throw his hat in the ring earlier and get him booted off the stage sooner.

But presidential politics, like “Idol,” is not really a talent competition (remember Taylor Hicks?), it’s a packaging competition. Unlike “Idol,” which can be entertaining, or technology, which can be confusing, politics is more like selling canned spinach.

Both major political parties have the same product to sell; only the flavors are slightly different. How complicated can it be?

“Brand A” is raw Republican, uncooked leaf spinach – for the resourceful do-it-yourselfer. You can cook it, boil it or, like Popeye the Sailor, eat it straight out of the can. “Brand B,” the Democratic choice, is pre-cooked, sterilized for your protection and pre-flavored because the Democrats, like Mom, know best. It’s priced based on ZIP code; the wealthy pay the most and the poor get it for free. That’s only fair, isn’t it?

As the acts of voting, flossing, eating breakfast and reading the news migrate to one convenient but rather expensive electronic appliance (the “iOwe”), I wonder where convergence will show up next. Perhaps, if Taser-parties are the 21st century equivalent of the Tupperware party, then a combination cell phone and “personal protective device” is the next big thing.

If that’s correct, then an advance word of caution to all female readers out there. Be careful rummaging through your purse for that chic pink-toned all-in-one on that not-too-distant dark and stormy night. You may be nervous because your car’s engine just died at the corner of Sullivan and Sprague, but you’re going to feel bad – really bad – if you put that thing to your ear and press the wrong button. And to all those guys snickering at the thought, I have this simple advice – just watch where you scratch with that thing.

And if, gentle reader, you’re like me and believe that life’s just too darn complicated, just wait. As the future steps out of the shadows we may all be in for a shock.