Eartha is a 56 year-old African American woman, who lives with her husband and two sons, ages 9and 12, in Germantown. She has lived all her life in the rowhome she bought from her parents in this predominantly African American neighborhood in the northwest section of Philadelphia. She and her husband have two grown children, who live out of the area.

Eartha works 40 hours per week as Director of Activities and Transportation at a long term care facility in nearby Mt. Airy. Her duties are to provide structured day activities, "like in a classroom or day care center, but for older people who are sick or dying or do not have a lot of energy." Eartha is trained in music education and music therapy and uses a lot of musical activities in her work, along with art, films, trips and such activities. She has worked in her current position for two years. Her husband is a vocational counselor who works for the state of Pennsylvania. Their annual income is about $70,000.

Free Time: Eartha says her job, while stressful, is not morbid, "because I have a lot of outlets." Music provides relaxation in her free time, in which she plays guitar, clarinet and saxophone with friends and family, and listens to "good music of all kinds." Another free time activity that she turns to as a way to unwind is doing puzzles that don't require much thinking. She also enjoys crocheting and sewing, although she doesn't find much time to do these activities these days.

She has a "side job" as a storyteller, and is very involved with the craft of storytelling, even when she is not being paid to perform. She is active in an international network of storytellers, and specializes in African and African American stories and folklore. Of storytelling Eartha says, "It's my therapy. It gives me a way to relax and to express myself."

Not much of a television-watcher ("I don't do TV") Eartha could not name a single favorite program. She said that she occasionally watches "mindless" game shows, such a s Wheel of Fortune" if her husband happens to be watching them. She may tune in a special on Channel 12, (the local PBS affiliate), "anything on culture, different cultures. I'm heavy into African culture, especially."

Eartha has a wide social network, in which she initially counted 200 people with whom she keeps in contact, but said she only considers 10 of those people to be friends she'd "invite to a dinner party" at her home. She sees all 10 socially and at club or church meetings. She emails 8 of them, and stays in touch by phone with 6.

Computer Usage/Email: Eartha uses computers at home and at work, and estimates she spends 90 minutes per week sending or receiving email, mostly at work. She receives more email messages (20) than she sends (4), most likely because she participates in several storytelling-related email listserves. Her non-list email contacts are predominantly business or work contacts. Personal emails are exchanged only a few times per month with family, friend and storytelling associates.

Information about Eartha is included on a storytelling web page, and she sometimes receives emails via that connection, from people who may have seen her perform, or who are looking for a local storyteller and find out about her through the web page.

Since she began using email, Eartha has noticed an increase in the number of people she is in contact with, which she thinks is because more people have computers and use them now, and because use of email "cuts down on the time needed for communication." Eartha thinks quality of contact has increased with email, because "people are more skilled in using the computer" to exchange information. "Things you used to fax you can now attach to email, and get more work done" in less time.

Eartha has never used chat rooms, but occasionally does use instant messaging (IM). One example of her IM usage is when she's working on a project online with someone. Since she only has one telephone line, if she's already using that line for the computer connection, if she wants to speak to the other person, she likes the immediacy and ease of sending an instant message" rather than disconnecting the phone from the computer to have a live conversation. She has also used IM when she needs to contact her husband from work during the day. He works from their home at times, and sometimes has lengthy online sessions. Eartha said that if she needs to communicate with him and can't reach him, because he is tying up the line, she sends an IM signal, and he knows to call her back as soon as he can.

Internet Usage: Other than for email, Eartha uses the web for about 10 hours per week at home, and about 3 hours per week at work. At home there are two computers. Her husband has the use of a laptop from his job, and Eartha and her two sons share a PC. She usually waits until late in the day to use the web, after her children are asleep and the house has "settled down," and often stays up until midnight. She finds the time goes by quickly while on the Web.

Her favorite website is storynet.com, where she looks for material for her storytelling work. "I can find what other storytellers are doing, find stories I'm using in my work, find information on festivals and on grants available." She also goes to dailypuzzle.com for crossword puzzles, for her own recreation, and sometimes for her job. When on the web for work Eartha is more likely to search and surf for "whatever my needs are for the day.," than to go back to the same sites. She uses google.com and yahoo.com to find information on holiday and special event activities to share with the residents of the care facility. In her most recent session on the web, Eartha went to the AARP site, hoping to find information on auto insurance discounts for AARP members, but she didn't find what she was looking for.

Eartha first recalls using the internet ten years ago, when she worked in a hospital, and she thought,

"This is amazing and creepy….I thought it was so weird, so futuristic. I thought it was more complicated than it was, and I was scared I would mess it up."

Comparing her internet usage to others', Eartha says "I'm not as serious about it." She considers herself more of a "lay" user than a professional user, who might use the computer more in business, or who has taken computer courses. "I find things out by trial and error." Still, she seems to be a moderately skilled internet user, familiar with the use of search engines, with downloading and file transferring, but she did not recognize the term "portal."

Eartha uses the internet to play games with her children on a site called kidsplace.com, or the Disney site, or whatever they're into. She thinks "it's healthier to do games with them" because of what she has seen or heard about. Within the last month Eartha was using the internet alone, and when she clicked on what she thought was an innocuous ad, was appalled to see "pornographic things popping up...That could have happened to my children."

Most of what Eartha finds on the internet impresses her more positively, however. She found some quilting references, which were very helpful in simplifying some storytelling work she did recently. And Eartha boasted about the car she bought last July online through her cousin's website. "It's a real car and I got it for a great price."

Eartha has used the web recently for news and political information, health issues, and science, as well as for cooking, tv listings and travel, directions and weather.

Interviewer: Carolyn Rahe