Sometimes you can very quickly date a story by the technology used (or not used) in it. Sometimes you watch a movie or TV show that is set in a certain time period specifically to lose a piece of technology that would solve a problem. (How many slasher stories would be solved by someone having a working cell phone? Notice how so many now are set in a rural setting to use the bad reception as a crutch?)
Sometimes you have a story, set not all that long ago, and it makes you realize how much has changed in the brief time between the story's setting and the present. Jason and I have been watching season 2 of GLOW, which takes place in the mid-80's. In the last episode that we watched, two characters, Ruth and Debbie, are tasked with writing the script for a scene they will be shooting. The director begrudgingly lets them use his type writer.
Ruth and Debbie brainstorm their scene and get more and more excited, culminating in the moment when they say, "yes! That's it! Let's get this on paper!" Debbie triumphantly sits down at the typewriter, lays her hands on the keys...then turns to Ruth and says, "I don't know how to type. Do you?" Ruth can't type either. They have to go find another cast member who can type so that they can write their script.
It was an odd moment. I was alive (though a small child) when this show takes place. I don't recall exactly when I began typing (probably middle school, when I realized that having my dad type my papers for me meant I was getting his AP style rather than my teacher's expected MLA style), but it's probably safe to say I've been able to type for 2/3 of my life. Not well. Despite taking a typing class in high school, I type with just a couple fingers on each hand. But I can type fast and with conviction; people often tell me that when I really get into it, my typing sounds angry. But I type every day. I spend a large portion of my day at work typing. I type to communicate, be it here, in an email, or in a Facebook post.
It was kind of an eye opener to see a skill that I quite literally cannot do without be a rare commodity not all that long ago.