People in the early 21st century wouldn’t see it as such, but Grandpa Ryan’s 70th birthday party was quite the celebration. No one was interacting. No one heard the sounds of laugher or dialog, and yet everyone was having a wonderful time.

Grandpa Ryan was born in 1972, back when phones were still connected to the wall and people were considered lucky when the TV showed more than three channels.

It was a primitive time back then. Wireless signals were limited to something called radio. Oddly enough, people actually would take the time and effort to visit each other and communicate directly. Such interactivity was necessary, although it seems so cumbersome and quaint in 2042.

Grandpa Ryan sat in his easy chair, leaning back looking into his eScroll. It was the latest gizmo from Apple, which included roll-up display technology. On the screen he could see his entire family, his sister, the cousins, the kids, and the grandkids. Even little baby Mohammed was watching on his first tablet, specifically designed for 1-year-olds.

For all the people present, the room was rather empty. Ryan’s wife Heather was in the kitchen, sitting in front of the eStove watching the cookies bake on her iPad screen. Caleb, Ryan’s son, was visiting, along with his two boys. The three of them were intently staring at their tablets; the boys playing an interactive game between themselves and some kids in Korea, and Caleb was watching a virtual ballgame.

The alarm on Grandpa Ryan’s wristpad, once known as the iWatch, went off precisely at 2:00 — or 19:00, as 24-hour GMT has been adopted as the worldwide standard no matter what your location.

The wristpad notified Grandpa’s eScroll, which displayed a message: “Take your pill.” The message was cc’d to Heather, who texted back, “L gt pil 1s,” which meant that she’d get the pill in a sec. Grandpa knew that the wristpad, which ran government-required software to monitor his health, would continue the warning and even start to vibrate and potentially irritate him until he actually swallowed the pill.

The next time Grandpa Ryan’s wristpad vibrated, however, it wasn’t to remind him he needed to take a pill. No, the wristpad alerted Grandpa Ryan that he was about to have a heart attack.

Ryan furrowed his brow as he looked at the wristpad. He felt fine, so he shook his wrist a few times to see if that would somehow correct the electronic message. No, the wristpad vibrated again. This time it sent out alerts to his immediate family. Three of them responded, “RU OK?”

The room was still silent.

As Ryan was swiping his reply, his right shoulder tensed. It felt like an elephant sitting on his arm. The wristpad began to audibly alert to the impending danger.

Caleb, sitting just a few feet from Ryan, still hadn’t received the message; he was in the middle of his virtual ballgame. Heather, still in the kitchen, tried to contact Ryan, but the video camera on the wristpad was aimed at baby Mohammed. Ryan was no longer answering the texts.

From across the country, texts came in, asking whether Ryan was okay or whether anything could be done.

Several minutes later, an ambulance showed up. It had been contacted automatically after Ryan’s wristpad received no manual input from Ryan or anyone else. Lamentably, the heart attack was massive. Had Ryan received attention earlier, or even been handed his pills, he would have survived.

Months later after a government inquiry, it was decided that the health law would be modified to provide a higher level of alert when a patient needed their heart pills. There was even talk of having an interrupt signal that would halt nearby electronic devices with a priority message, but the app manufacturers balked. Their customer base was too important and didn’t like interruptions.