I’ve had two phones die in the span of two weeks, and it has made me reflect on connection and loneliness in the midst of the busy turning of the world. One night, in the middle of sending a text, while I was cleaning up the house and getting ready for bed, my phone suddenly froze, and died. Total black screen. I pushed all the buttons over and over again, tried charging it, tried hooking it up to the computer, but it was gone. And suddenly I felt very alone, with my desktop computer as my only link with the world. I don’t have a landline phone, or an iPad, or even a laptop. I spent the next two days in a strange world of solitude, hovering between contentment at my freedom and anxiety at my aloneness. I ran errands with only my wallet in my pocket. There was nothing to constantly look at throughout the day, checking for texts, emails, any signs of connection. Instead I sat down at the computer at set times and checked my email and looked at the news, but I was otherwise disconnected. It was a relief not to know what awful things were happening in government at all hours of the day. But it was hard feeling separated from the immediacy of connection with family and friends at the push of a button. No one could reach me, and I only reached out when I sat down at my desk to connect.
I did not have a mobile phone until I graduated from college and got my own car. It seemed like a necessary thing if I was going to be driving around to be able to call for help. That was the only benefit I really saw in carrying a phone around. Very few people were sending texts and no one was surfing facebook and twitter from their hip pocket. Growing up we had an old-fashioned answering machine, and more often than not, one of us was around to answer the phone whenever it rang. In college I had a phone in my room, with a cord, attached to the wall, and voicemail. I spent all day out in the mountainous landscape—in classes, in the greenhouse, out in the field working or doing science—and returned in the evening to check my voicemail. Mostly I didn’t get calls except from my family to say ‘hi’ and chat about our lives. All of my friends were immediately accessible just outside my door, across the hall or down the forested path to the other dorms. There was no facebook, only encounters in the dining hall or on the main lawn or in the dorm common room.
But it isn’t like that anymore. I live apart from all of the people I call friends, some near and some far. Most of my day is spent in my quiet house or in encounters with strangers at the grocery store or the park. I don’t have coworkers and I am friendly but not close with my neighbors. For better or worse my phone is my connection with friends and family. I can pick it up and hear a familiar voice or have a conversation in text, or see photos and read stories on facebook.
After two days my replacement phone arrived, refurbished and unlocked, from Amazon. I felt calmer as soon as it had booted up and restored my data; my friends and family once again were within reach. But I also felt tethered; it weighed heavy in my pocket when I went out, and I felt the need to look at it all the time, checking to make sure I didn’t miss a call or text or email. I got sucked back into the depression of constant news updates, which is a major downfall of facebook. There is no escape. Mixed in with photos of my nieces and messages of hope and condolence from friends, is news of political corruption and the rich trying to take from the poor and violence everywhere. I had gained back connection, but at the cost of an over-awareness of the state of the world.
When my new phone died less than a week later, with the same final blackness of the blank screen, I was a bit relieved. It turns out being connected didn’t prevent my friend from being snatched away from me by sudden death. And being without it didn’t prevent me from having the best kind of connection, time spent with friends face to face over coffee and in church singing and praying, elbow to elbow with people who care about me. I have another phone now, but I’m not keeping as close an eye on it. Instead I’m sitting outside watching the forest turn green and reading a book about the complicated nature of community. I’m considering taking up crochet again as something to do while I watch TV at night, instead of scrolling endlessly through my newsfeed. Life feels very fragile at the moment, as I navigate between love and solitude, but I am trying to be more present in it.
The Inclusive Community 