This is not my phone.  No…my phone is not shattered or sad or broken apart.  It’s shiny and new and…dead.  Just like that.  Kaput.  This photo is an old phone of my daughter’s I am humbled to use. I will not go out and buy myself a shiny new phone.  I am teaching my children a lesson.  I am teaching myself a lesson.  I am not spoiled.  Okay, this is all a lie.  Let me post the true version.  Here are ten things I learned (more or less) the day my phone died.

1. You need your phone much more then you thought you did:
I was in a doctor’s office on a workday when my phone died. Without warning. Without blinking or failing or dropping or shattering. It just decided to stop. Working. Like. That.

Suddenly the waiting room was filled with other people on their phones. Wow. Everyone has a phone.  What do I do without  my phone in the waiting room?  Well, I love magazines — magazines might become an option as I wait for an hour and forty five minutes to see my doctor. But… it then occurs to me: how can I text my people to let them know I can’t text them? How ironic.
I realized I can’t access work email so I can’t email to let anyone know where I am. There aren’t any pay phones anymore so I would need to somehow contact work, my husband and children, by borrowing someone else’s phone… but who?  All kinds of crisis then popped into my mind including but not limited to, “shoot I could get fired for disappearing since no one knows where I am!” and of course: “What if something happens to my mom, my children….me?”

Then I went to fix the problem as fast as possible by going to the iPhone store.  To do so without a phone  which was equally baffling. You can’t access your own account without the info that’s stored on the now dead phone…you can’t text your husband to discuss this or get help. Basically you are stuck.

After my ineffectual and worthless visit to the Apple Store and its required 1.5 waiting period (for further details, see item number 4 below) I left only to realize I was unable to go to my next doctor’s appointment for the day because I don’t know the address or even the phone number of the doctor (not even the location).  And moreover, I can’t call to find out or even as a courtesy to tell them why I am late or lost.  Also,  I am directionally challenged and need  my gps.

2. You need your phone much less then you thought you did:
Well, truth be told….it was somewhat liberating and exciting. It gave me an excuse to not communicate at all. And I did not have to feel guilty about it. I decided that I might as well try to fix the problem at the Apple Store and get to the doctors and surrender to the dilemma. Call it a sick day. Relax. Chill. And….get off the grid. So what? Read a hard copy book at the doctor’s office (which I coincidentally had in my bag). Get off Facebook. Don’t text or be texted. Everything can wait…. It was a slice of freedom I have not felt in years….which brings me to realization number three.  Don’t tell anyone but I did find it secretly thrilling.

3. My name is Karen. And I have a phone problem.
Yes, this was a reckoning that I have a big addiction problem to the phone….
So add two and three above together and what happened? Husband and I watched an episode of “Stranger Things” instead of trolling Facebook. I talked to him in bed instead of staring at my phone. I got off social media for a nano second and felt the loss and mostly the gain of it all….

4. The Apple Store is a vortex of hell and a virtual world existing to make you think they are servicing you, the customer.  However, the employees are mannequins employed to act as though they are helping you while secretly covertly encouraging you to buy a new product of some sort when yours become mysteriously frustrating to fix and notoriously obsolete.
4a. I will call this 4 subsection a….the ATT store is equally frustrating. they were “offline” for two days so unable to access any information which to me should translate to giving me a free phone but apparently….it does not. A technology company that is not technologically advanced enough to be on line during business hours. Only slightly scary….

5. My daughter has an alias.
I went home to get an old phone of my daughters pictured above. You can see there was no glass on it to protect the screen. I put my SIM card in it. And yes I have been trying to survive using this substandard dinosaur (insert saracam giggle please).   Next, I texted Bella a mommy-gives-daughter-personal-advice text. Yes, personal.
And I looked down to see I had texted this to “Brian.” I imagine my horror. What if “Brian”, whoever he is, figures this out. Bella will be mortified. I decided not to tell Bella as she would get really upset with me. But i reassured myself this was not a big deal, after all, there is no way this “Brian” knows my phone number.
Then,  I texted her again and looked down to see I had again mistakenly texted “Brian”. This must be cuz I can’t see jack shit with this tiny font and broken screen. Again I’m horrified cuz now I am stalking this “Brian”.  Again I kept my mouth shut.  I am notorious for texting the wrong person and would only subject myself to chastising from everyone in the family. “Mom why don’t you read who you are texting”.  “Put on your glasses”.   But,  when I texted Bella ever so carefully this morning, with my glasses, telling her to get her shirt out of the drier and saw that yet again  I texted “Brian” I pulled the car over and checked her contacts and found out that she IS Brian. I asked her why she is “Brian” in her contacts….I guess it a very old nickname from two hers ago.

6. I do not know anyone by phone number and do not now know anyone’s phone number including my own children. A bit scary that I have become a slave to my contacts in my phone. Now I am getting texted and have to try to politely ask : who is this and what is it you are inviting me to? Remember when caller id meant you could see a phone number and not pick up if it was someone you did not wish to talk to?  I don’t know anyone’s number at all!

7. I am pretty much blind nowadays. I can’t see ANYTHING with this tiny itty bitty font and couple that with the cracked screen….I seriously can’t text right now so if I don’t respond you now know why. I was very spoiled as most of you know being able to dictate and use the giant font. This situation has broken me of my habit (and I’m guessing that’s a very good thing).

8. Passcodes should be stored in some other place besides the phone. Obvious reason as to why …..no need to expound.

9. My inner conspiracy theorist has emerged. Is it at all curious to anyone but me that my phone miraculously goes dead the day before the iPhone seven is released. Isn’t is curious that Apple does a download (aka….zaps your phone dead….via remote secret covert plans) right before their new phone is launched causing you to spend seven hundred dollars on this device you really should learn to live without since life was so much better before you needed this screen ? I mean really….I asked everyone else in the Apple Store if they too were suffering from the conspiracy !

10. Whose ring tone is that anyway? Imagine the look on my face of utter annoyance at the obnoxious “One Direction” ring tone that won’t stop. Oh….shoot. It’s my ring tone. I’m carrying the old phone is what used to be an eighth grader!

okay….you get one last thing…so mea culpa, a little bit more then ten. things…

10 +.  Get the insurance! I’m so proud of myself that I got phone I surface cuz guess what? I get a new phone for my deductible ! Which is far less expansive than any new phone anywhere on the market. Yippee.

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