Rich Russell teaches composition, literature, and creative writing classes at Atlantic Cape Community College and The Richard Stockton College of New Jersey. What’s defunct in his life? “What I fear is becoming more and more rare is true human interaction with one another and also the physicality of objects, such as books and sympathy cards and even checks. In this piece, I explain how we've lost most of our bookstores here in South Jersey: either no one is reading anymore or everyone is buying e-books and shopping online. Not only the books themselves, but that essential "third place" where people meet up or go just to browse among fellow bibliophiles is lost. This is true as we replace more and more traditional college classes with online sections. I am a (cautious) proponent of online education myself; still, I wonder, at what cost is all of this technology to us as human beings?”