Well, the time had come for the Fords to finally complete their family, and they did so with a bark. Not a bang. A bark. Yes, we got a dog. Not just any dog, but a kick-ass, fun-loving, 2-year old rescue from the Missouri Humane Society. Upon meeting him, his given name was Maury, and while I tried to remain neutral about said name, every time I heard it, I immediately conjured up images of paternity tests, screaming women, and mental images of Maury Povich saying, ‘You are NOT the father’. Yeah, that name had to go.
Meet Bernie/Bernardo/BernBern/TheBernerator/Bernardino/Bernasticator. He’s a sweet boy with quite the personality. We have had the pleasure of his company for over a month now, so I suppose it seems only fitting to mention him in this blog post.
I think he’s sticking around for a while. Bernie is my homage to my failed Presidential nominee, but that’s where the similarities end. He’s a typical canine teen and needs some good obedience training and consistency with his humans, but we are up to the task, even if the toddler and cat of the household aren’t so certain.
Finished up a really nice vacation in Michigan, visiting my mom and son last week. Why is it that time just seems to literally FLY by? Ugh. I hate the end of vacations. Seriously. At least we have some guests coming for visits in September, a trip to Boston in October, and a return to paradise (Kauai) in late November. That should round out the year nicely.
One other interesting wrinkle in the recent vacation was the fact that in the hustle and bustle of planing, deplaning, toddler wrangling, and overhead compartment space, I managed to leave my beloved iPhone 6 Plus in the seat back pocket of the seat in front of me. I realized it once we arrived at the baggage claim area, and I was frantically searching for my gadget to check in on Swarm/update Facebook status/text someone.
I was actually quite calm about it once the initial shock wore off.
I mean, so what? I am literally surrounded by technology in the form of my husband’s cell phone, my mother’s iMac, cell phone, and a variety of other connected devices. Was I truly ‘unplugged’? Never. Did I tempt myself with those devices a handful of times during the course of the week?
Yes.
But, it never held my rapt attention as it had in the past. I was happy to be disconnected. I felt free. I felt unencumbered by some perverse desire to share mundane minutiae with ‘friends’ and ‘acquaintances’. It was deliciously liberating. As a result, I went to see a matinee movie with my son and walked in absolutely devoid of any sort of technology to silence, shut off, or otherwise disable for the duration of the film.
Wonderful.
I also enjoyed a relatively tech-free day at Cedar Point amusement park with said son and husband. The only evidence of our day was a short coaster video and a photo or two taken by my husband’s iPhone to chronicle a soaking wet, happy wife to mark my 48th birthday as I rode the wettest flume ride to appease the child that resides inside.
That. Was. It.
Did I glance at Facebook during the car ride? Yep. Did I update a status or two? Sure. Did I allow the phone to pull me into its whirling vortex of time sucking emptiness? Nope. I felt changed. I felt different somehow.
See, the thing is I’ve never been without my trusty cell phone for longer than it takes for me to close my eyes and sleep. It’s always with me. I admit, I even use it when I shower, as it doubles as a streaming audio device for purposes of listening to music or the occasional NPR news broadcast. I am nearly ashamed to admit it was the last thing I looked at before bed at night and the first vision I saw in the early morning before my eyes could even adjust to wakefulness. Such a damn shame.
I found myself waking up during vacation feeling relaxed, refreshed and actually looking forward to real interactions between my family, rather than spending time peering over the top of an iPhone screen, half-distracted between listening (not really) and nodding absentmindedly as my husband details a funny story that happened to him at work.
This just feels different this time. Perhaps it was meant to be, somehow. Eh, bullshit. I left my phone behind out of some absentminded parental lapse. What came after that, however, has left an indelible impression.
I’m sorry.
I’m sorry to my friends, family, husband, and children for living in a state of near-constant distractedness. I’m sorry that when you may think of me, you have a vision of a woman with short, colorful hair always with a phone clutched in her hand. I’m thankful that my son grew up in a time BEFORE the ubiquitous cell phone, yet I’m sad that my daughter already may have a memory of her mother staring down at one.
What did I miss most about my phone? The camera. I wanted to capture moments on this vacation, yet I didn’t feel compelled to necessarily SHARE those moments with social media. I shared an image or two, but NOTHING like I would have before. I was grateful to my family for snapping a few photos, and that satisfied my inner shutterbug.
It all feels so meaningless. In the greatest fucking way possible.
I just don’t care anymore. And I don’t care that I don’t care anymore. Ok, you get the idea.
What do I care about? I care that I’ve managed to devour a REAL book in a matter of days. Oh, Stephen King, how I’ve missed our visits together. I care about the fact that I don’t have the Facebook tab open on my computer, as I complete a grad school assignment. I care that I’m actually LISTENING and having real and meaningful conversations with friends and family, and most of all, my husband. I am looking people in the eye, not darting back and forth between iPhone and face, iPhone and face, iPhone and face. I care that I’m not multitasking. I’m not trying to watch a television program WHILE updating Facebook/reading a post/replying to a comment. I care that I’m here, blogging about it, because damn it, this is important to me.
So, today, my iPhone is being returned to me in the form of a FedEx delivery vehicle. I have tracked it, but beyond that? I don’t feel the usual overwhelming excitement once reserved for that little piece of technology.
I almost feel a little sad.
I’m sad that this little experiment is being forced to an end, yet at the same time, I feel determined to make this feeling last. And one things is for certain:
You won’t find this blog post on social media.
