this past monday was a typical monday. almost rear-ended 3 separate vehicles: check. forgot to pay ella's daycare payment: check. sat in coffee: check. ruined iphone in said coffee: unfortunately, check.
you've seen movies where a character is screaming and then it flashes to a screen shot of a mountain top or forest or some distant place, indicating that the person's scream can be heard that far away? well, that's how i felt. and in slow motion. when i returned to my car after dropping ella off at daycare that morning and my brain registered that the foreign object bobbing in my coffee cup was in fact my phone, i could just picture birds in a far off wooded area flying out of the trees from my shrieks as if a rifle had been shot. sure enough, my phone had slid from the console where i had set it into the cup of death below.
now, i'm not super trendy when it comes to gadgets and technology. i don't have an ipad. i don't twitter. and for the longest time, i refused to get an iphone. but in the year that i've had it, i've become addicted. i facebook from it. i pay my bills on it. it contains all my appointments. i can't travel without its map app. i listen to music on it at work and in my car. it holds the phone number of everybody i know. and if i decide to ever start exercising, i've already downloaded the "couch to 5k" app.
so after a trip to at&t on my lunch break and hearing the devastating but predicted verdict ("i'm sorry...there's nothing we can do until you're eligible for an upgrade on february 1st..."), i decided that maybe God was teaching me a lesson. maybe he was telling me to lay off the coffee. or perhaps to be more responsible with my belongings (much as i try to drill into my own children's heads). or maybe, just maybe, he was saying, "hey...stop being a slave to your phone. it doesn't own you!"
so what great revelations have i made during my week sans iphone? well, i've learned how annoying it is to try to have a conversation with somebody who has an electronic device glued to her hands (madelyn and ella, i'm talking to you...) and now understand why my parents gripe about me having my phone at the table during meals. i've learned that i CAN live without facebook. i've realized that i should memorize more of my friends' phone numbers. i've learned that i really need a hobby. i've discovered that there is always going to be a photo opp when you don't have a camera handy. i've determined that at&t doesn't care if you've been a loyal customer for 8 years, that doesn't mean you'll get any sympathy or special treatment if your phone is subjected to water damage. and i've learned that i really, really need to invest in some travel mugs. really.
