Yesterday, while in the middle of a rather intense school/work day…my iphone decided to just plum give out. It had been throwing a little bit of a fit, and then just, well…bit the dust.
For a moment, I gazed in horror at the black screen of my unresponsive device. Then, I got the giggles.
I will never forget the first phone I had. My mom and dad got this Nokia flip phone that could be run over by a tank and still operate in the hopes that they might be able to track me down. I had a habit of disappearing off somewhere horseback and just not coming back till I felt like it. Unfortunately for them, I did not WANT a phone. I did not WANT to be gotten ahold of. I did not enjoy the little beeping device. If you asked my mum what it was like when I was a kid, she probably would tell you it’s not much different than now, “she's feral” is how most of my family responds. And I like it that way.
That first phone was sacrificed to the river. My bay horse Cappy and I went to cross the Finley river when it was a little too high (there were caves on the other side to explore!) and it never recovered. Poor mom, I was pretty happy I’d lost that son of a gun. But, they got another one. I don’t exactly remember what happened to the next one, but somewhere between Cappy and I hauling my 14 ft tipi via travois to the next camp site, my attempt at a trap line and midnight escapades across the pastures…the dang thing disappeared. It went on like that for a while. I sure hate to admit it, because my poor parents just wanted to make sure I was safe and they kept replacing the damned things before realizing maybe it wasn’t quite an accident. But having that blasted brick in my pocket felt, I don’t know. Icky?
I remember the first bag-phone I ever saw. This mysterious contraption in the old square body pick-up mom and dad drove when we lived in Northern Nevada at the Big Springs Ranch. It never dawned on me we would be able to haul one of those things around with us in our pocket one day! When I was a little older, while driving across Nebraska as a family my dad told us girls that one day, we would be able to explore the “world wide internet” while driving down the road. We looked at each other incredulously, we thought daddy had lost his mind.
There was a time I grabbed atlases before going on a trip to navigate around a big city! There was a time the phone was something you checked on the wall when returning home.
Fast forward to yesterday afternoon staring at my little dead Apple device and giggling.
Boy, the prospect of navigating Washington D.C. without the help of that little phone sure made me nervous! Now I know there are many arguments for and against this technology we find ourselves so constantly attached to…but today I find myself strangely thankful for this little device for a number of reasons.
The negative aspects are numerous yes, but for a girl studying so far away from the people she loves…it is a Godsend. When I’m missing the big empty spaces of home, photos of the mountains make it not seem so far away. On days I feel hemmed-in by people and the noise of town, the tunes I play on that little thing make “my people” not feel so far away. When I get out of class, I still usually call my momma or grandpa and chat about what I learned and saw. Even my dear friend who detests technology and admittedly lives closer to the last century than this, texts me on an archaic flip phone from the mountaintop. And it is a gift.
The danged thing is working again, but for just a minute, the world was still. Washington D.C. kept spinning and thrumming with energy and I kinda enjoyed the moment of peace.
Maybe when I graduate, that little phone will accidentally get lost on some fateful river crossing….you never know! ;)
Happy Thursday my friends, I hope it’s a beautiful day.
xoxo
AB
