"Computer as a second language." PBP with me.

My desk top at my church office was playing up so a young guy, Mark (early 20's) came down to the office after church. He looked at it for me and played around. He did not do anything that I could not do, but clicked onto issues much quicker than I would. He was moving the curser around the screen, clicking and responding to things much much faster than I would ever do. I was pushing just to read the scripts in the time he took. I, who enjoys playing with computers more than most my age, felt illiterate! I got to thinking about this.
We deal with people often with English as their second language. They can be very good at their english but you can see them having to think about it. You will say a sentence and they will go over the sentence in their mind to grasp it, before they can respond. As they speak english you can see there is just a little extra effort composing the sentence. For us, it is second nature and comes easily, but for them, they can do it but it is a slower process.
I started my working life as a plumber. I worked for over five - six years in this field. Whenever I do plumbing now though I notice it is a slow process. I had to do the waste pipes for a Habitat for Humanity house a few years ago. I took a day off work and did them. I got a carpenter friend to arrange for a plumber to look at them to check out I had done them correctly. He said, "Tell Dave I would give him a job anytime, that is a great job!" My response was that he would not like to pay for the time it took. Because I had been out of plumbing for so long I had to think about everything I did. What once came automatically, easily and quickly now had to be processed and took a long time.

I thought this is the difference between me and Mark (and other younger generation people) on the computer. I am reasonably computer literate for an old bloke. But what I need to think through and process, comes as second nature to the young Marks of this world. I have "computer as a second language", Mark has "computer" as an automatic, almost instinctual native language.

I say to you young Marks of this world, PBP.... Please be patient with us old blokes, we have "computer" as a second language... to you it is your native tongue!