Memory is weird. This morning, as I emerged from a vivid dream about my first encounter with what we might call the “proto-internet,” I found myself marveling at how some memories fade within minutes while others resurface with stunning clarity decades later. The dream transported me back to the summer of 1989, when my mother had just begun her undergraduate studies at the University of Southern Mississippi, and I was about to stumble upon a connection that would change my life.
In those days, I was an outsider, a kid without many friends until fate led me to a group of college students who shared two passions: Dungeons & Dragons and computing. Through them, I discovered my sanctuary in an unlikely place: a small computer lab tucked away on the upper floor of Forrest County Hall. Unlike the other labs scattered across campus with their rows of PCs, this space housed something different—about twenty Wyse terminals with their distinctive green-on-black displays, all connected to a Honeywell Bull mainframe.
The memory of that space remains remarkably tangible. The constant symphony of cooling fans provided the backdrop, punctuated by the staccato rhythm of the massive dot matrix printer. The air conditioning kept the room cool enough for the equipment, but I remember the warmth of belonging that I found there. Through those tiny screens, I glimpsed a world far bigger than my small Mississippi town could contain.
What strikes me now is how different those early online interactions were from today’s instant gratification platforms. Everything moved at a more deliberate pace—communication was primarily through email, creating a thoughtful asynchronicity that seems almost foreign in our current age of instant messaging and social media dopamine hits. Each interaction felt more intentional, more precious.
The screens flickered as my newfound friends typed commands in what seemed like a secret language, each keystroke an invitation into their digital world. I spent countless hours that summer learning their arcane ways, watching the green text scroll across the screen, feeling like I was part of something larger than myself. The memory is so crisp that I can still hear the click-clack of the keyboards and see the monitor glow reflecting off my friends’ focused faces.
This morning’s unexpected memory has made me contemplate how profoundly the internet has transformed since those early days. What began as a small, intimate community has exploded into a vast, ever-expanding network connecting billions. The access to information and communication we have today would have seemed like science fiction to that wide-eyed kid in the computer lab. Yet with this progress has come a certain loss—the intimacy and simplicity of those early digital connections have been buried under an avalanche of notifications, likes, and shares.
As I write this on my iPad, I find myself holding two truths simultaneously: a nostalgia for that simpler digital age when computers were tools for connection rather than extensions of our identity, and a deep appreciation for how technology has enriched our lives, enabling us to bridge vast distances and share our stories with the world. Perhaps what I’m really longing for isn’t the technology itself, but the sense of wonder and possibility I felt in that humid Mississippi summer.
Memory shapes who we are, constantly evolving as we weave new experiences into the tapestry of our past. And while I cherish those formative moments in Forrest County Hall, I’m equally grateful for all the memories—both digital and analog—that have followed. In this ever-shifting landscape of memory and technology, one constant remains: our fundamental need for genuine human connection, whether mediated through green-on-black terminals or high-resolution touchscreens.
When those old memories surface unexpectedly, they offer us a chance to pause and reflect. They remind us that while technology evolves at a dizzying pace, the core human experience—our desire to connect, to belong, to understand and be understood—remains beautifully unchanged. Memory may be weird, but in its mysterious workings, it reveals the threads that connect our past and present selves, weaving together the story of who we are becoming.
