This past week I was in Dublin, Ireland celebrating St. Patrick's Day. While there, I experienced the unfortunate incident of losing my phone/getting it stolen. I'm still not sure which happened, but the fact that someone unzipped my friend's purse while we were in a crowded bar has me thinking the latter.
It's a week later and I still don't have a phone. No worries, it's on the way. UPS is just being particularly slow, of course. If I had ordered, say, a pair of socks, they've would've been here ages ago. But being away from my iPhone for a solid week has surprisingly taught me a lot about myself and about our culture's strong reliance on technology.
Even going home from Dublin to London proved a bit more inconvenient just because I didn't have a phone. Instead of doing mobile check-in through my email, I had to stand in the long check-in line and deal with a very rude worker. Instead of ordering my bus ticket home from the airport in advance, I had to wait until I landed in London. Instead of having access to CityMapper to map my way home on the Tube, I had to figure it out myself (and I did it!). So while these aren't huge inconveniences, I made it home fine, and had no traveling issues, having a phone would've made it all run a bit smoother.
Not having a phone has made me realize just how much I use it, especially when I'm alone out in public. The amount of times I reached for it to remember it wasn't there was definitely too high. I felt like my fingers were itching to do something; they needed to be engaged. I'm now convinced our generation has a new disorder called "restless finger syndrome," since we've become so accustomed to them being occupied on phones, tablets, etc.
Being unoccupied by Snapchat or Instagram, I was able to look around me on the Tube. Almost every single person was on their phone, aside from those reading a book or newspaper (and even they were far and few between).
Don't get me wrong, I love my phone. Like, love. Like I'm checking my email and UPS tracking my package every 10 minutes, because I really want and need my phone. But not having it for this past week has made me think about all the little things we miss when we're on our phones, like looking out the window when we're on a car journey somewhere or talking to your friends while you're out to dinner.
If there's anything I'll take away from this, it's that I really don't need my phone as much as I thought I did. Does it make life a lot more convenient? Yes. And is Snapchatting your weekly Starbucks fun? Yes (for some reason). And it's a true comfort being able to be in constant contact with the people you love.
But now I know my phone isn't a necessity for when I go out somewhere, go to class, or even travel. All I really need to take along is myself. And maybe a watch because looking over strangers' shoulders to see the time could be taken the wrong way.
