My Favorite Apps are the Ones Before My Meal*

Last Saturday I left my phone sitting outside next to a water bottle filled with ice water.  The drink sweat enough to create a pool of water that drowned my phone, setting in motion the series of events that led to me being close to tears in the Target parking lot over what kind of case to get to protect my new phone, which, as the people in the AT&T store and Target told me fifty eight times IS GLASS ON BOTH SIDES.  Thanks, got it.  It seems to me that if you buy an expensive item that it meant to be carried in your purse or pocket, it should be durable enough to withstand a purse or a pocket, and you shouldn’t have to spend an additional $50 on a case to protect it.  Go capitalism!

My old phone was meeting my needs perfectly:  I could talk, text check my e-mail.  Now I have a world of new options and aps, which for most would be exciting but I’m apprehensive.  I’m thinking about Alan Lightman’s essay, Progress, from one of my favorite books, Dance for Two (a book sale find from a few years ago, by the way), a collection of essays.  Lightman is a physicist and many of the essays in this book draw on the connections between art and science. The overall premise is that you can’t claim to just be a math person or just be an art person, everything is so connected that you have to be both.  Progress examines the definition and responsibility of each of us in regard to technology and, well, progress.  Here are bits and pieces so you get the point:

“For at least the past two hundred years, human society has operated under the assumption that all developments in science and technology constitute progress…in the twentieth century the concept of progress changed, becoming increasingly tied to technology and large dehumanized technological systems…Today, a crucial question before us is whether developments in technology inevitably improve the quality of life.  And if not, we must ask how our society can employ some selectivity and restraint, given the enormous capitalistic forces at work.  That is a terribly difficult problem for several reasons, not the least of which is the subjective nature of progress and quality of life…I am certainly not opposed to technology as a whole; I benefit greatly from it.  But we cannot have advances in technology without an accompanying consideration of human values and quality of life…How should this examination and questioning proceed?…The problem cannot be solved from the top down.  It’s a cultural problem.  Perhaps we must regulate ourselves.  Perhaps we must think about what is truly important in our lives and decide which technologies to accept and which to resist.  This is a personal responsibility.  In the long run, we need to change our thinking, to realize that we are not only a society of production and technology but also a society of human beings.”

When the sales person at the AT&T store told me I would like my new phone, I didn’t doubt it.  I’m sure it’s great.  But when she, and many others since then, have told me how many “great apps there are for your kids!” I pulled into myself a little.  I don’t want my kids to play outside less because they’re playing an inane game on my phone.  I want to keep bringing a bag of toy tools to Discount Tire so they can “fix” all the tires on display in the waiting room while we wait, not sit zoned out to a YouTube cartoon.

I don’t like sitting in a room full of my friends watching people click away on their phones or ipads.  I’m not blameless, I’ve certainly sent or received a text in the company of others.  But I don’t want to become someone who zones out on a little screen instead of engaging the world around me.  I just have too many other things I want to do:  quilt ideas bouncing around in my head and a closet full of fabric scraps ready to make them possible, plants to water, bread to bake (Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day is technology I will lovingly embrace), cats to feed and stop from sharpening their claws on the couch.  I have family and friends who love me and I want to love them back by being present with them.

So new phone, hello, welcome to my purse and kitchen counter.  I will use you to connect to people, but I reject your calls to make me waste energy on things that add no value to my life or the lives of those around me.  I reject your zone-out-your-kids apps.  I reject your e-reader and will go chat with the librarians and work on the stacks of books overflowing from our shelves.  Although I will look up maps and directions , I reject your GPS.  (You really don’t want to get me started on the GPS, but I’ll say this:  devolution.)  I will take your music though.  Hello Pandora in the kitchen and in the car.

I’m counting on the help of my friends and family to brutally make fun of me if you see me abusing my new phone.  Brutally.  Let’s keep it real.

 

*You know who it is:  Liz Lemon