Staying Disconnected

So this past weekend, I broke my phone. Spilled a drink on it without realizing it was still in my pocket. Fell asleep. Fried it when I tried to plug it in. Not smart, I know. So I woke up Sunday morning without a functional phone. For those of you that don't know, I have been using an iPhone for 10 months now, and, needless to say, have grown accustomed to it. Not a huge app user, but I did my share of using my iPhone to its capabilities and generally enjoyed having it as a phone. Nervous about not having an upgrade through my AT&T account, meaning not me, or either of my parents, I wasn’t sure what this would spell out. I wanted to address the issue as soon as possible, but without fully knowing my options between AT&T, Apple, or any other alternative option, I didn’t want to rush into a financial mistake. Either way, I figured I would take a substantial money hit once I finally figured it all out, and was none too excited about this.

As it turns out, money is not the purpose of this post.

14 months ago, I wrote about staying connected. With the means of communication these days, there isn’t an excuse in the world that you can make to lose touch with those that you care about. Well, I fully understand that my sample size is miniscule at best, but there was something unexpectedly refreshing being without a phone. Please ignore the fact that I spent one of those days sequestered to the couch watching football and paying attention to my losing fantasy team. Also ignore that I pretty much never signed off gchat or Facebook. And keep in mind that two of those three days where spent in the office, where the beginning of the week rush was in full bloom, even as the outside was just the opposite. So to say I was ‘out of communication’ would be a bit of a stretch.

But let’s say that this refreshing splash of pseudo-isolation is one part lack of communication, one part decreased dependency.

Part one: Lack of Communication

So like I just said, I was barely ‘out of communication,’ and I have already written about the importance of staying connected, but there is a something to be said for being outside the loop for a little while. With the emergence of Twitter, gchat, and Facebook statuses, people are collecting information from their friends and peers at an astounding rate. Add in the cell phone, which not only allows you to access all of those things, but also includes phone calls and text messages, and it can be too much. There are some commercials out there advertising for Bing, claiming search engines like Google or Yahoo create search overload, and I think the same types of symptoms can arise due to overstimulation of we’ll call them ‘bits of social media information.’ It can be exhausting keeping pace with the constant flow of information. Without a phone by my side, not only was slightly more isolated from accessing others, but vice versa. There was a comforting delay in not hearing my phone vibrate and seeing it light up every dozen or so minutes, be it an email, text, phone call, or a new move in Words With Friends, because I am a nerd and I play scrabble on my phone. Now I know my phone doesn’t really blow up that often, because let’s be honest, who is really in that dire of a situation and needs to talk to me?

But I guess the point of being out of reach is that it makes the communication exchanged a little more valuable and meaningful. The overstimulation of bits of social media information saturates the content and floods the filter, so much so where the daily and mundane are piled in with the relevant and pertinent. It’s like when cell phone minutes were valuable, or when it used to cost 50 cents for a collect call; you had to pick your spots. A trend that is all but dead. Granted not having a cell phone meant no one would be able to call me, but you get the idea. Having one source of information eliminated does add value you when information needs to be passed along. For that, it was refreshing.

Part two: Decreased Dependency

This is a similar can of worms, and something my dad has preached about for years, but back when cell phones were first getting popular, he could not understand any reason (aside from emergencies) that someone would want to have a phone with them at all times. My dad loves the idea about being out of reach. Granted, more times than not, he wants to be as isolated as Jack and Elizabeth (See: Pirates of the Caribbean), so his opinion probably isn’t too ‘balanced,’ but the point remains valid. Think about why vacation is so appealing. I once wrote that it’s so appealing because they are escapes from everyday life and allow us to be independent. Well what could be a better escape and more independent than being unreachable? It’s a 2010 version of freedom.

And if I would have had a longer stay without a cell phone, there would have been a few more nuances. I would have had to take down numbers with a pen and some scratch paper. I would have had to actually go and see somebody instead of punching away at text messages. I would have had to coordinate plans days in advance instead of saying ‘I’ll just call you when I’m leaving.’ It wouldn’t have been an issue for me, but no more calling from the car to get the last few turns to your newest destination, you have to get the full directions before you leave. It got to the point in three days that I was forgetting what I could and couldn’t do without my phone. I’m going to the bank, do they need my phone? No, no, just I.D. What about driving? Nope, still don’t need it. Got pictures printed at Walgreens, and they ask for a number, but will they actually call it? So many questions.

But as it turns out, I walked into the Apple store on Tuesday and they replaced my phone with a new one, free of charge. There was pretty much nothing that I truly missed doing on my phone, except maybe Words With Friends. And the whole (3-day) experience left me realizing that I don’t need my phone attached to me. It’s nice to be dependable, but it’s nice to go rogue for a while, go dark, under the radar, and escape for a while. If you can’t find a way to get out of the country for vacation, and you live in such a hell hole that a ‘staycation’ won’t even be worth it, then how about you turn off the cell phone, log out of Facebook, why not even turn off your computer, and see what it’s like to be free.