We can all joke about how "important" we are while holding our cell phones... texts, snaps, notifications coming in from all over the place... with every piece of our lives attached to some invisible cloud that really isnt a cloud at all...
But the true test of our character comes with the most unfortunate of situations... when our cell phone becomes lost. (cue EVIL, scary, music)
Panic slowly sets in. You look (for about 5 seconds) then try to remember and dial your own number... walk through the house hoping you might hear the ring tone... then remember it is set to vibrate. Then any slight sound... the dishwasher, music beat, a car outside, the heating vent, your kids tickle me Elmo (after you "misplaced" it's voice box the last time the batteries went in)... any little noise sounds like a silenced cell phone.
The last draw... after 10 minutes...
Notifying every living being with all sources of social media you can remember the passwords for... become distracted while scrolling, reading and staring at your computer screen until the heating vent under your desk makes the same tone as your lost phone... digging through the layers of forgotten garbage to find.... nope, the heating vent.
All is not lost, the car has not been turned upside down yet... and then it hits me. Way back, in my smoking days I would go through the same horrible panic if I had lost my pack of cigarettes... really?
I realised my phone had actually become as addictive as smoking had been.
What did our moms do when, say (for just a crazy example) we shoved play dough up our nose, and the principal was too afraid to go in with a set of tweezers? Or maybe when a mouth was frozen to a metal fence, and lips were to swollen to suck our thumbs and comfort ourselves after pulling them off the frozen child trap... imagine how we must have suffered without our moms!
What happens to emails that sit for more then a day, or a snap that never is seen?
I like to think I am important. I like to think I am needed, not just your regular "Jo"... I like to think I am the only one that can do a certain number of things just the right way, and no one could ever replace me...
Truth is, there IS only one me... but I AM replaceable. Let it sink in, I know, it hurts... But the human race will go on after you, and I are gone...
At the core to every cell phone addiction (with the exception of blowing half your life savings on an i phone in which your obsession is tied in with a whole other number of things) is arrogance... face it, deal with it, and put that cell phone down for a day or so. You may find that the addiction lessons after time, and with it, your understanding of being replaceable.
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