The year was 2000, the start of a brand new millennium, when a disgruntled Bonnie Hopps came walking through the front door. She had just gotten home after picking paper products, some dry goods, and a few other necessities from the grocery store, and it seemed to her husband that something was troubling her mind. Even if it was for something very small, it hurt him to see her upset about something.
"Was some of the stuff we needed out of stock again?" he asked her, thinking that might have been what the matter was.
While that would have been a disappointing circumstance, since the grocery store was a bit of a drive away from the farm, this was not what was on her mind at the moment. "No, I got everything that was on the list," she replied.
"It wasn't that rude buck at the checkout that handles the produce roughly? I never go in that line because of that either."
"No, it's not that, Stu. Matter of fact, I don't think I saw him at the counter he normally works at."
"What is it, sweetheart?" he asked her, sincerely wanting to make her feel better.
"Oh, it's nothing that I believe can be fixed," Bonnie responded with a sigh, walking over to the nearby pantry to put what she had just purchased away. As Stu walked over there with her, she continued, "It just feels like the times are really changing, and I guess I'm not the biggest fan of that."
"What do ya mean?" wondered Stu.
His wife put that last two jars of tomato sauce away on the bottom shelf of the pantry, shutting the door to it again and setting the grocery bag to the side. "It's like wherever ya go nowadays, ya see almost everybody in the stores carryin' around and natterin' into one of those new-fangled cell phones. Like, everyone in the aisle doesn't need to know that you're having pizza from some new restaurant for dinner."
Stu was most certainly not very knowledgable when it came to continuously evolving technology, but he knew why this was getting to her. After all, he and his wife went their entire lives without carrying something around in their pocket to call home with when they went out in public, and everything was perfectly fine. It seemed that the simpler times from decades past were just thrown out the proverbial window. "Yeah, I never thought those cell phone thingamajigs were that interestin' anyhow," he said. "I thought the landline phone like the one we's got in the house is enough."
"Exactly," Bonnie responded, glad that he was on the same wavelength as her about the topic. "And if you're out in public and need t' get a hold of somebody for whatever reason, ain't that what a payphone's for?"
Stu nodded his head in concurrence. "My thoughts exactly. But I guess there's no puttin' a halt on everybody else gettin' their paws on one of 'em and takin' 'em where they go."
"I suppose you're right about that, honey," Bonnie agreed. "Just know, though, that I'm probably not gonna take the same route. You can quote me when I say that I will never be the one somebody sees carryin' one of those around."
The year was 2007, and Bonnie, whether she wanted to admit it or not, ended up taking back what she said before about never having one of those cell phones on her.
With the landline phone being the dying breed, killed off by the rise in other technology, the Hopps Family ended up having to ditch the curly-corded device that remained on the wall for quite some time. After a good amount of hesitation, Bonnie decided a year ago that it was time for her to try out one of the latest phones that was on the market.
And that decision turned out to be a pretty good one in her book.
Throughout the time she had it in her possession, the flip phone turned out to be much better than she first expected it to be. Not only could she take the calls for orders of the family farm's produce more conveniently, but she could also send messages and even take pictures of the children with the phone's little camera.
"Well, we're all super happy to hear that everything went well," Bonnie said, the flip phone she had in her paw up to her ear as she finished the conversation she was having with her older sister. "We'll definitely stop over for a visit really soon… Alright, you have a good day now… Okay, buh-bye."
Click! She hung up the phone and flipped it shut, setting it on the coffee table in the middle of the living room. She returned her attention back to the television, which had been playing cartoons for some of the children sitting in the room.
The channel just went to a commercial break, and one of the advertisements that played was an announcement for something new hitting the market just in time for the holidays.
It was the introduction of the very first model of something new called the iPaw.
The young children in the room paid no attention to this, though, their eyes no longer glued to the TV. They were patiently waiting for their favorite show that they watched on weekends to come back on, not very fond of the commercials unless it was for a cool toy they would eventually add to their holiday wishlist.
From the chair in which she sat in, Bonnie shook her head as the features of this new device were being shown. With the technological changes happening midway through the decade, she was half-expecting production to start on flying cars at this point. "Stu, did you see about this?" she called out to her husband.
Stu was just walking into the room from the kitchen, a cup of fresh vegetable juice in paw, when she asked this to him. "What's that, hun?" he inquired back.
"They just showed this new phone that's supposed to come out soon," Bonnie said, pointing to the television screen just as the commercial shifted to something else. "Get this… There's no buttons on it like mine has. You touch the screen to dial numbers and stuff."
"You serious?" her husband replied with a look of surprise.
"I just saw it. And not only that, but they're also saying that you'll be able to watch shows and stuff on it. I mean, they told us not to sit too close to the TV because it would rot our brains, and now we're gonna hold this thing right in front of our faces?"
"I'm with ya 'ere, sweetheart," Stu agreed. "Why in the world would somebody wanna watch somethin' on a little screen like that when they're on the go? That's the last thing I'd be thinkin' of doin' on a trip."
"I don't see what the problem is with the cell phone I got," Bonnie remarked. "I'm fairly certain that I won't be switching to one of these anytime soon. And I'm also certain that I will never fall for any other fad they decide to come up with next."
It was the present year when Judy walked into the burrow, coming back from her and Nick's little shopping excursion further out in the area. When she and the fox came over for her annual visit to see her family, changes around were always visible around the place she happily called her home during her childhood. Normally things would be redecorated or rooms would be changed around whenever she stopped by, so that was she was originally expecting to see in the back of her mind.
What she saw when she stepped through the door, however, was most definitely not the sight she thought she would be seeing. The last thing she would have anticipated was her father, who she knew was far from enthusiastic about gadgets, wearing a virtual-reality headset over his eyes.
Judy and the fox beside her observed him from where they stood. Her father was dead in the middle of the living room, darting his head in both directions and gripping onto what appeared to be two little controllers in his paws.
"What in blazes is goin' on 'ere?" Stu mumbled, appearing to be frustrated with whatever game he was playing on that headset. "Boys, there's some kinda monster thingy in front of me. How am I supposed t' shoo it away?"
Standing next to him were two of his sons, nine and ten years of age, trying to help him figure out how to use the thing.
"You can't just shoo it off, Dad," Josh giggled.
"You gotta use your powers," Daniel suggested, sounding as if he knew that was the key to winning because he had played it before. "But you gotta be fast or he'll get you."
"How in tarnation do I do that?" their father asked with confusion. He turned himself around to face the other direction, only to jump suddenly at something he presumably saw in the headset. "Somethin' just sprung right up at me and it all went dark. Did I lose?"
"Yeah," Josh responded.
Stu slipped the goggles off his face, his eyes readjusting to the brightness of the room, and placed them on the coffee table. He took his load off on the couch a few inches away, the game his sons just showed too complicated for him. "There's too much to remember with that one," he said. "I dunno how you're supposed to stay focused. There ain't a farmin' game on 'ere or somethin', is 'ere? Wanna see how lifelike they make it on that thing."
"I don't think there is, Dad," Daniel chimed in.
From the other side of the room, Bonnie added, "And we've got fields of real crops to pick from if we're lookin' to do that."
"I think there's a chess one on here you'll like," Josh mentioned to his father, since he had learned to play that from him and shared that bond with him. "Only you're one of the pieces on this huge board."
"I oughta just stick with the regular chessboard you and I use to play," replied Stu. He turned himself around to look over towards the front door, seeing that Judy had returned to the burrow. "Hey there, Jude. How did the shoppin' go?"
"There was a few little things Nick and I thought would be nice to take home with us," Judy told him. "Anyway, I wasn't expecting to see the day you'd be using one of those new headsets."
"Well," her father explained, "it was actually a birthday present to those two. They just came up to me and said I oughta try it, so I thought it was worth a shot. But that ain't the only gizmo we got our paws on now." He turned over to look at his wife. "Honey, come show Judy how that new thing we just got works."
Bonnie walked over towards the table near the entrance, the newest model of iPaw in her grasp just then, pressing the button on top of what appeared to be a sleek white speaker. It glowed slightly and made a noise that sounded like a hum when she did this. "Play Judy's favorite songs," she said to it.
There was a few seconds of silence before the smart speaker understood her request. "Okay," it chimed in its automated feminine voice. "Playing the playlist you created of 'Judy's Favorite Songs.'"
Surely enough, just as the device said it would do so, music started to fill the area and travel towards the living room. The tune that arose was something Judy hadn't heard in a long time, one that gave her nostalgia and took her back to when she was younger.
Bonnie clicked the volume down—a bit too loud to continue a conversation against—just a hair before walking back over to where she was standing before.
"Never thought you guys would buy some of this stuff," Judy said to her parents admittedly. "I remember when I was growing up that you were never fans of this technology."
"Well, Judy," Stu responded, "things have changed a lot throughout the years. And if ya don't evolve with the times, you're sure to fall behind."
"That's right, Stu," chimed in Bonnie. "Your father and I always thought that some of this technology would be very useful in the future, and here we are."
Judy could only shake her head, knowing from what she remembered them saying years ago that this was not exactly true. Had she told her parents in the past that they would own some of these things in the future, they would have told her that that was downright ridiculous.
Author's Note: This was one of the sillier stories that I've been wanting to get written for a couple days now. It came to mind I was reading this random article I encountered about the iconic cell phones from the early 2000s, which were all awesome then but are now pretty primitive compared to the phones and the other smart devices we got today. The idea for this just suddenly started popping into my head then, and I just thought it'd be interesting to center this one around Judy's parents.
Anyway, I hope you all enjoy this little story of mine. And as always, your feedback, whether good or bad, is gladly appreciated.
'Til next time! :)