Something New

On welcoming the invitation of a glitching phone

Me and my brother helping my YiaYia bake the daily bread in the outdoor oven.

My phone is glitching. It doesn’t bother me because I’ve been wondering how urgent my carrying such a technology really is. After all, I grew up all the way into adulthood without the internet or a cell phone (PRAISE GOD), and now having had some decades of comparison I’m not at all convinced the constant connection did or does me any real and lasting good at all. But having tethered myself to this small device now all this time, losing it seems akin to purposing to cut off my right arm.

And yet I kind of secretly hope at times that I would lose it. As in, oopsie, it fell from my hands off the state ferry crossing the Puget Sound as I was taking yet another photo of another landscape that I will never again ever look at other than within the square box at the time I took it and avoided enjoying said landscape with my own eyeballs. So, the glitch is kind of a welcome annoyance at the moment, perhaps the beginning of a wistful goodbye.

I’ve read many useful books: How to Break Up With Your Phone, Digital Minimalism, The Shallows. But years later, even after implementing many of the very good suggestions, I still find myself annoyed by the attachment, the Have-To of it all. It’s uncomfortable having nothing to listen to when I am exercising, walking, or cooking. I still check my phone for messages throughout the day. One day, I counted twelve times alone just receiving and responding to messages, sprinkled throughout the entire day, interrupting whatever else I was doing at the time. I am terrible at wanting instant information seeking: I want to know what the weather is, and going outside—even looking out of the window—would take longer than punching in a few digits and swiping. How DO I spend hours on this stupid device?

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One evening while knitting up a sweater sleeve, I scrolled through YouTube and found an interesting video recommended to me. The title is The Only Thing that Stopped Me From Infinite Scrolling.

Bah, I thought. I’m not really infinitely scrolling at all, because I have children who command my attention all day long, and housework and homeschooling to do besides. But I was sick of watching news clips, so I bit.

Six days later, I understand why this young man has over 263,000 views already.

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“Reach for the pen,” he says.

Now we’re talking, I think. I don’t even read a book without a pencil in hand, and my idea of a dream vacation is writing for endless days in my notebooks. In only ten minutes, this host suggested numerous ideas to not only help break the scrolling habit, but to gain traction on other habits, simply using a PEN and a NOTEBOOK. Granted, he ended up using Remarkable instead of paper but the format was the same. And instead of coming up with yet another hack or system or step-by-step guide, he discussed paying attention to the cues that make you and I reach for our phones.

Aha, this is different.

Within minutes, I am pulling out my notebook and drawing a line down the side. On the left, the time it is when I reach for my phone. On the right, the reason and/or the cue. This accomplishes two things for me. One, I begin to get a real life picture of my habit. And, two, it starts me along a good habit of putting a notebook under my nose at all times instead of my phone. Both follow me around the house for a few days.

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The messages are what I use my phone for the most. Because I keep my ringer off, I check for messages regularly, easily every hour or so. Then, I respond to messages. Or I send them. Rarely do I have a thought about someone I need to connect with, and not do so within the hour. This goes beyond basic texting, for I also connect with people via email (in three different places), via multiple groups on Telegram, WhatsApp, Marco Polo, Nostr, and here on Substack. That’s a lot of rounds to make.

This is new. There was a time when connecting meant meeting up in person, or chatting on the telephone, or writing a letter. I didn’t do any of those things every hour! I’ve become available to everyone at all times. Is this a good thing? I’m not sure.

I start to consider: if my phone died, how would I connect with these people? I make a note to start moving over my checking messages to my desk top, where I sit only a couple of times during the day. I also make a note to ensure my extended family and closest friends have my landline telephone number. In my mind, I make a wishful note to someday live within walking distance to my dearest friends, knowing this might not come to pass before heaven.

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On Substack, somewhere, I read an article about an author during one year giving up his phone for Lent. I’m intrigued. He did return to his phone at the end of his break, but what I found more compelling were all of the comments. I am not the only person feeling trapped (addicted?) to carrying a smartphone everywhere and using it for hours upon hours every day. Many of us, it seems, wouldn’t mind an oopsie my phone is gone.

I don’t like the feeling I get when I think of not having it. That alone makes me feel like an addict.

I never wanted to be an addict. Are we all addicts now?

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Rich—the YouTube host mentioned above—uses his notebook for other things besides noting cues for his addictive behavior. He keeps a food log, and an easy habit tracker. This also makes me happy, because he makes it very easy (and inexpensive). Keeping my notebook close to me during the day enables me to start paying attention to IT instead of my phone. I notice my cues drop in half in only a few days.

I also take note of what my personal cues are: needing a breather when I’ve been far too rushed, and needing stimulation when I’m far too bored. Funny how my phone became The Answer for both extremes. I think about coming up with alternative choices for both scenarios, but I also know myself well enough to know that it’s keeping the chocolate out of the kitchen that keeps me from eating it, not the rules of when and in what situations I might partake.

I tell my oldest son, “I think I’m going to give my phone up for Lent.”

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Now that I have a deadline, I look for alternatives in earnest. I probably don’t need to check any messages or email whatsoever outside of my computer, nor do I need to get onto the internet. I find a small calculator and put it in my desk drawer. I copy my FlyLady homekeeping assignments and print them out (before discovering I can log in via my computer). I’m not sure what to do about my podcasts and music, but perhaps stepping back from those for a short time will be enlightening. I also use my phone for budgeting, but I am able to save receipts and do that also on my desktop.

It seems to me that taking time on my desktop for these tasks two or three times a day will be a far better use of my time than worrying about it every hour. After all, I don’t want to be inaccessible. I just don’t want to be accessible At All Times to the detriment of my other responsibilities.

What I think I will miss most is my camera. I used to have a DSLR, but gave that to my son who loves to use it. When I ask for his advice, he helps me to find a small one that he thinks I will enjoy using. It’s small enough to fit in my bag, and I’ll avoid the temptation to share any photograph immediately.

I dunno. Maybe this little experiment will actually work.

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A few days later, our family takes an adventurous day to attempt to visit all nine of our county’s libraries in one day. We spend most of the gray and rainy day driving, and only manage to get to five before our library bags are bursting.

One of the books I borrow is a cookbook called YiaYia, and it’s the first one I begin to read. As I read, I almost choke with a sense of homesickness, as many of the stories could have easily reflected my own YiaYia, a woman born in 1914 and having lived her own hard life in a two room house within a small village nestled in the remote Peloponnesian mountains. I remember the foraging, getting water from the spring to carry home in many jugs, the neighbor’s donkey we sat on, the chickens she fed who lived under the house. I don’t know her story; I’m just one of the “lucky” ones who got to grow up and live in America eating food wrapped in plastic from a store, leaving behind poverty and a sense of place.

I wonder what she would think of my struggles, my house, my life (my phone!). I’m almost embarrassed. I think she would smile as one does to any foolish grandchild, wave her hand all around as if wiping all that nonsense away, and simply hand me an apron. Who would she need to text, I wonder? I’m guessing anyone who needed her would take the time to show up on her doorstep or call her on the one line they had in the village. I remember walking the trails to the small village store for that one telephone, for news of what was going on in the world, for social time with the neighbors. I for one am tired of making those kinds of rounds via a screen.

I see her now in the black and white photo by my desk, sitting and peeling potatoes from her apron, her black stockings slouched by her ankles. I am snuggled up beside her. Was she ever bored, I wonder, ever need an escape from real life? What would she have done with a smartphone? Her life was, at least from the minimal amount of childhood observations I was blessed to have, difficult and plain. She was quiet. She never rushed. Perhaps the simplicity of her life was what allowed her to be so purposeful and present, at peace even with all the chaotic relatives around her when we came to visit.

Maybe the glitch on my phone is an invitation.

Maybe I’m ready to learn something new.