My grandmother, whom I so lovingly call ‘Granny,’ is…how do I put this nicely? Technologically incompetent. Yeah, that’s a good way to say that. It took her three months to learn how to check her e-mail and she’s always saying  things like: “I don’t have Google, I have this thing called Bing!” No, Granny dearest, everyone has Google.

For any of you who have ever tried to teach an older person how to use a computer, you know how frustrating it can be. They don’t really understand that it’s supposed to be simple and that you don’t have to do everything perfectly. So, how did I get roped into training my grandmother to use YouTube? It started out with a book…

I was on the phone with Granny, telling her about a book that I had just read (read that as “was lazy and listened to the audiobook on YouTube”) and she said it sounded interesting. I took a deep breath and told her that if she wanted to, she could listen to it as well.

That started it all. When she asked me to e-mail it to her, I had to explain that it was divided up into separate videos. She didn’t understand the concept of a ‘playlist,’ so after about 20 minutes of explaining that, she logged into her e-mail and I had  to tell her how to find the message I sent her in her inbox, despite it being highlighted and bolded for her convienence.

Then I had to teach her how to control the video. The first question was “Where does the sound come out?” Another lengthy explanation about how to turn the speakers on and then we were off. The “little red triangle” (play button) and the “two little bars” (the pause button) became her new best friend.

I’m rather proud that my grandmother can now listen to the audiobooks that YouTube has to offer, but at the same time, I’ll be taking that Nobel Peace Prize now.

This is my world, welcome to it,

Nikki Culver