A few years
ago, I posted about my 24-hour stint without a cell phone after it had been
stolen. I felt like a fish out of water
at the time, obsessing over who was trying to reach me and what supposed earth-shattering news I might
be missing as a result. (Truthfully, it was probably just a slew of messages
from my mom asking me if I was still alive.) Of course the world kept turning
and my life went on during my phoneless day, but I felt like I had learned
something by the end of it… somehow I didn’t feel the sense of urgency to reach
for my phone once I got my replacement. I felt oh-so-enlightened about “Dina’s
day without a cell phone”. I reveled in how I managed to meet up with a friend
with no communication at all as if it was the equivalent of rescuing someone
from a burning building. But now, three and a half years later, I’m not sure if
I really learned anything at all.
Working in
hospitality as I do, you get to observe human behavior up close and personal. As
a server, I am the metaphorical fly on the wall, bearing witness to how my
guests conduct themselves in a public setting. (And as you can imagine, some do
better than others). There are things I see and hear that I wish could be
deleted from my memory bank. However, one thing I find universally fascinating
is people’s cell phone etiquette, or lack thereof. It simply astounds me that almost EVERYONE
has their phones out on the table at ALL times. Whether the person is a
teenager or someone well into their retirement, people seem to be obsessed with
being connected at all times.
We all love
our phones. I get it. I love mine too. But I think there’s a problem when your
cell phone becomes a better companion than the person sitting across from you.
I regularly go into restaurants and see people texting or checking social media
instead of interacting with the people at
their table. Everyone is so busy looking at what’s happening EVERYWHERE
else and what they MIGHT be missing out on, that they’re actually missing out on what’s happening right in front of them.
And I know I am guilty of it too. Far too often my cell phone is out on the
table, and although my phone is on silent at all times, when I see it light up
I just want to see who it is. It’s like a compulsion. And the fact that I run out of data every month tells you that my phone needs to spend less time in my hand and more time in my purse.
Remember
the days before cell phones? I do. When you angrily stood at a payphone in the
middle of winter, freezing your ass off in your open-toed platform heels as you
called into your answering machine to find out why the person you were supposed
to meet wasn’t there? Oh, the plans changed and now said person is at a different bar
clear across town? (Insert expletives of your choosing.) Ah, those were the
days. Still, things always seemed to work out in the end and my social plans
were always saved from disaster. And the bonus was that once there, there were
no cell phones to distract you from the real live person you were hanging out
with! Can you youngsters picture that? It was glorious.
I’m not
advocating the elimination of modern technology. Before cell phones existed, what happened if
your car broke down in the middle of nowhere in the dark of night? Does that
scenario sound like the beginning of a Stephen King movie? Well, it happened to my
college friend back in the day and there was no payphone nearby—not that she
would’ve gotten out of her car to look for one! Lucky for her, a car pulled up
with a nice elderly couple inside. True story. They even invited her to stay at
their home for the night. In fact, this couple was so good to my friend that
she invited them to her wedding! Now that sounds more like a John Hughes film,
doesn’t it? We could call it “Home Away From Home.” Suffice it to say, I don’t
want to go back to the days without phones. I just want to find a happy medium
for myself. As my friend Dee just said to me, “Technology is there to serve
YOU. You are not there to serve IT.” (Dee’s a smart lady.) With that said, I’ve
decided to keep my phone in my purse in social situations. I think it will be
nice to unplug from the rest of the world and just spend time with the people
sitting at my table! Of course I will inevitably pull my phone out occasionally to check it. I’m not a
martyr. Besides, my mom isn’t the only one who likes to make sure that the people
she loves are still alive!
No comments:
Post a Comment