I Miss Pressing Buttons — Let Me Touch Things Like I Used To

Our textureless world is dulling our senses.

Photo by Kat Love on Unsplash

Touchscreens have no touch to them. They’re cold, textureless pieces of glass. They have no feeling. Flat. Sleek. Thin. Everything has become so inhuman. There’s a reason sex toys are ribbed. The human body is bumpy and flawed. Have we been projecting our fear of textures onto the world? Lasering off every benign skin tag, smoothing out those varicose veins.

When did texture become taboo?

Everywhere you look, it’s smooth and sleek. Brushed steel and hardwood floors. Porcelain. Glass. No wonder the G-Spot is a myth. I strain to remember anything bumpy that I’ve felt in decades.

We need an adult Fisher-Price computer desk. Every office will be filled with them. A metal crank that you have to get up to turn like a ratchet until the computer boots up. Oh, god, the inconvenience. The labor!

You have to molest a squishy piece of green goo to activate the monitor. The mouse is a set of spinning conveyerbelt rollers that everyone fantasizes about whirling. That swishhhhh sound, the staple of an experienced roll. What will you use to log online today? The sandbox rake? Or the yellow groan tube. The jarring gulppppp sound opens Google. Stalking your ex on Instagram today? Use the Wack-A-Mole interface to your left. Be careful not to smack the wrong one and accidentally Like their picture.

As a kid, my sofa was a spaceship’s wall covered in dials. I twisted nobs. Switched switches. Pulled levers. Pushed. Buttons. The satisfying resistance of the imperfect plastic, like mashing the A-button on an old Mortal Kombat cabinet. The passion of slamming your fist down on buttons that would never break.

We’ve become a dystopia of digital ease. I don’t even need to turn the key in the ignition anymore.

(Take a deep breath to avoid being the next Unabomber.)

Bring back the Home button on the iPhone. Let my touch turn something on. Better yet, give me a keyboard that slides out of the side of my phone. Put that little red nub in the middle, and let me rub it raw until it needs replacing. TVs don’t even have buttons anymore. I touched TVs more than myself back then.

Touching is forbidden. The first rule of Coronavirus Club is, you do not touch people in Coronavirus Club. But the absence of touching started long before this. I recall being scolded by a teacher for running my hands through Becky’s hair as we sat on the Reading Corner carpet. I was only repaying her for scratching my back during yesterday’s Bill Nye video. Then we all got suspended for touching.

All our senses are dulled. We are taught from childhood that we have five senses, but then spend our adult lives suppressing them. The entire room cringes when I crush a water bottle. Are the sounds of touch bothering you too? Sounds have become illegal. Don’t talk back! Put your phone on vibrate! Use your inside voice!

SHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

It’s no wonder everyone is on Youtube listening to people whisper and eat marshmallows.

Nothing feels alive anymore. It’s Smooth. Odorless. SILENT. I fantasize about running around the office with a tiny baseball bat, shattering every screen that crosses my gaze. Taking my phone off silent and letting my Snoop Dogg ringtone fly free. Filling the odorless Febreeze bottle with jasmine. Oh, the humanity!

I will forever be the person who touches your computer screen instead of just pointing at it. Fear the wrath of my greasy fingers and the wobble of the LCD.

Please give my senses back.

Let me touch the world like I used to.