Cell phones, smart phones, mobile devices, pads, skype, drouds, IPhones, flip phones, car phones. I remember when they were just phones. Yep, that is what they used to be called. The funny thing is that the actual function was to make a phone call. That is where two people, I mean living humans, actually had voice communication. You didn’t ask some Chic with an Indonesian name if she could find you a blow up doll, or some alien sounding electronic voice wanting to know your credit card number but an actual human voice. Real phones are funny looking things. Large and clunky. They used to even have wires on them. Sometimes they were even in two pieces. Shit....get out...no really I remember that. The banana shaped things that would deform your ear. Ours was located in this weird looking hole in the wall in the hallway? Why the hallway? I guess was the central location or something. I would sneak in there and attempt to call Kelley from there. No real conversation but still it was a big event. At least I could hear breathing on the other end. How about car phones? Remember those? Those huge grey things with the heavy wires going to some unknown place in the dashboard. I think you got about 10 minutes for 95 dollars or something like that. No one I knew could afford to actually call anyone but they looked cool in your ride as long as you had enough leg room for the cast iron mounting system that resembled the underside of the stadium bleachers.
The “hand phone” brought the world from the hallway into the light of the modern world. Those cucumber sized things with that weird antenna soon decreased in size. I mean its obvious size does matter.... Unfortunately, smaller has now gone out of style again. As our civilization progresses....I use that term “civilization” with some reservations... we are now completely dependent on these strange little playing card looking boxes. (oh, remember playing cards? Not the shapes on the computer or the device but paper things). We can’t live without them. We design our lives and emotions around them. They are now an instrument of love. No...not that just yet....shame on you. They move worlds and economies. They coordinate airstrikes, set off IED’s, find fresh sushi, and the strangest to me....convert the spoken word to text.. Often they are the most looked at, hoped for, feared, and prized things in our lives. Why? My own personal experience is just the above. Hoping for that special text, or waiting for the email or text that you know will just hurt or make you mad and who knows...might just make you smile. How many times have you just looked at the stupid thing and hoped for it to tell you something. Over and over. Waiting...
So...the big question! ARE WE NUTS?. Wait for it...don’t go for the obvious immediately. Ask yourself what would happen if you ... had no service? I realize that most of us would walk, crawl, drive, or climb to another place. You can’t be off the grid. No way. Being out in Terlingua and parts beyond has made me do some thinking about connections. What do they mean? What could you live without if you had only .001 MB of “data”. Who would be the text or the email? It’s like putting a message in a bottle and only having that little yellow stubby pencil that you used to get when you went to play miniature golf with your girl. The stubby tiny things that were completely flat with no eraser. You know. You only have a few words and you have to make them count. I know this sounds like an Ebola Twister game to most of you but just think about it. NO SERVICE is almost like the announcement, “Brace for Impact”. Do me a favor? Take a few days and turn the “Device” off. I know I know... you have responsibilities. But humor me. You will need to go through the nine stages of device grief and that can be ugly.
- The on/off. You can only keep it off for a few minutes.
- Separation anxiety. Going to get it in the car when you are supposed to be romanticizing.
- Sneak checking your mail. Ugly and usually done in the bathroom.
- Leaving it for a full day.... peace followed by panic, when you remember you haven’t checked it.
- A day without connectivity. The world keeps turning. The kids didn’t get arrested for drugs...your deal didn’t fall through....your mother is still around... the yard man showed and cut the grass..
- A few day of actual conversation, maybe a movie, some whoopie, maybe reading a mag on the john again.... Just a different perspective.
- The pre- apocalyptic aura phase. Where you have perceived flash forwards of things you are supposed to do or things to worry about.
- Relapse. The ugly truth about “Device Addiction”. You are a down trodden, humiliated shell of a human being, controlled by “inbox”, and IM, or Text, destined to be forever enslaved by a fancy remote control that brings no joy to mankind.
- Getting the new bigger, faster, more powerful device with more data.
Oh, sorry gotta go....I’m in a high spot now.
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