“Remember the good times? When phones were dumb, and people were smart?”
— Spotted on a tee shirt. Worn by someone using a smartphone.
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Old movies and television shows are the best. People enjoying life with each other. Without a cell phone. Where the only phones we had were tethered to the wall with a cord.
In that not-so-long-ago time when there was no expectation of being instantly and always available. Before being anatomically attached to a cell phone was considered a vital sign of life.
“Is he going to make it, Doc?”
“It doesn’t look good. His heartbeat is strong, but he’s losing cell phone signal.”
Who can argue that smartphones have enhanced some aspects of life? But who can deny that, like most technology hailed with the hooray of reducing workload and making life easier, they have also heaped harmful effects on society? One, the inability to develop quality interaction and conversation skills without hiding behind an electronic device. And two, the mental health hazard of never comprehending it’s not only OK to enjoy personal time disconnected from the world, but it’s also healthy.
“Wow, look at that gorgeous sunset!”
“Hold on. I haven’t checked messages in ten minutes.”
With all this weighing heavy on my mind last week, I launched an experiment. I turned off my phone. That’s off. Not silenced. For 24 whole hours.
It was pure heaven. Peace and serenity unequalled since television stations (all three of them) signed off at midnight with the National Anthem.
After a couple of hours, it crossed my mind that my kids might try to contact me. Not my daughter. She started practicing cell phone use only during selected hours long ago. And my son? He calls more than my daughter, but he’s a busy guy and travels a lot. If he misses me, he’ll leave a message or call back. Maybe someone involving business will need me. Maybe not. This was a Saturday.
Satisfied that anyone wanting to talk to me could wait, I relaxed and enjoyed the bliss of no one “reaching out to touch me.” To coin a twist on an old AT&T jingle.
But when I turned the despised device back on …
“Have I offended you?” The tone of the first text message was hurt.
“Have you seen that message I sent you? It’s been half an hour since I sent it, and I haven’t heard from you. Call me. Now.” Let’s label that one impatience.
“Where are you,” another yelled? Such frustration.
The idea of going “you can’t hear me now” mode came to me a couple of weeks ago. In a business meeting where everyone was reviewing reports and participating in discussions. Or at least doing a better than reasonable job of pretending to be interested.
Except this one guy. Silent. Head bowed. “How inspiring,” I thought. “While the rest of us are laboring with the load, he is praying for divine guidance in plotting a business course.”
Then I saw it—thumbs flying on his cell phone under the table. “It must be important,” I thought. Apparently. It was important enough that he spent the entire meeting head down, looking at his phone. Chuckling and texting.
Or maybe it was the day I heard someone shout, “What’s the matter with this guy? Everybody today has a cell phone permanently attached to their hip.” Frustration and rage. Because he had not received a response—in less than five minutes.
Actually, his exact words varied slightly regarding the precise part of human anatomy to which he felt phones were forever affixed, but you get my drift. I must admit however, when you notice how many people have cell phone protrusions in their pockets and which pocket predominately protrudes … I don’t know. Maybe Mr. Impatient’s analogy was more than a metaphor.
Call me crazy, I know, but I bought an old phone at an antique store, just like the one we had at home when I was a kid. A black one with a dial. Ours was in the kitchen. It was the only phone in the house. Convenience or coincidence, the cord was long enough to reach the dining room. So it was easy to grab a chair and talk.
“Leon, the phone’s for you.” My sister sounded perturbed. “Hurry up. I’m expecting a call,” was her last shot before surrendering the phone to me.
“You kids get off that phone, now,” Mom chided from the living room where she watched Perry Mason on our black-and-white television. “It’s a school night.”
It was just a few years later when my mother stood on the front porch and said, “Bye. Call me when you get there. Call me from a payphone if you need me along the way. I love you.” I was leaving Mount Pleasant, driving to my uncle’s house in Southern California. I was nineteen years old, way before cell phones were even science fiction fodder.
My favorite act of rebellion against being surgically attached to a cell phone might be the prank I pull in restaurants. Where for some inexplicable reason, business associates and family alike feel it’s rude to ignore phone messages, but not to ignore those with whom they’re having dinner.
When that happens, I often ask everyone to place their cell phone in the middle of the table for just a minute. Once all the phones are stacked neatly together and curiosity peaks, I announce, “First one to touch their phone picks up the tab for the whole table.”
Then I start a conversation. Like the ones in old movies and television shows. People enjoying life with each other. Without a cell phone.
“Say, did anyone see that episode of Perry Mason where he …?”
Maybe, just maybe, it’s not too late to reverse the intelligence of people and phones—back to the way it used to be.
—Leon Aldridge
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Aldridge columns are published in these newspapers and magazines: The Center Light and Champion, the Mount Pleasant Tribune, the Rosenberg Fort Bend Herald, the Taylor Press, the Alpine Avalanche, The Fort Stockton Pioneer, The Monitor in Naples, and Motor Sports Magazine.
© Leon Aldridge and A Story Worth Telling 2024. Excerpts and links may be used, provided full and clear credit is given to Leon Aldridge and ‘A Story Worth Telling’ with appropriate and specific directions to the original content.
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