"You're a smart guy," said a member of the motorcycle gang I belong to. "You should have a smart phone."
My dear sister-in-law also became impatient with my explanation about why I hesitate to trade in my World War I coal-burning cell phone, for a smart phone, or however you spell it.
I told her I don't want to be tempted to check my email at the park with my kid, on the golf course, in a restaurant, in a bookstore, in the tavern.
I paraphrase her, but closely: "What's the matter with you? Why can't you just be like every other normal person and check your email when you want to and ignore it when you want to?"
I interpreted her message as having two subtexts: 1. What makes me so special that I can't be bothered to keep track of my email obsessively like everybody else? 2. And, if I'm so fucking special, why don't I demonstrate some of that specialness by resisting the urge to check my email obsesslively like everybody else.
I'll take these reasonable questions in order:
1. I'm a writer. Since I don't acutally know anything about anything, what I do for a living is organize common experience and regurgitate it to others in ways that make life make a little more sense to all of us. To organize common experience, I must first organize my own experience. And I can hardly organize my experience if my daily existence is akin to that of a proprietor at hot dog stand in Midtown Manhattan. (Witness the wee number of great novels from hot dog stand proprietors.)
2. My specialness as a writer doesn't make me less susceptible to all the sad people-pleasing, conflict-avoiding, hope-hungry instincts that drive everyone to madly rub their phones like genie lamps with a billion wishes. I have wishes too!
But I got a SmartPhone anyway, because the DumbPhone was just too dumb. (Or I was. I couldn't even get pictures or videos off of it.)
And when my writing falls off, I know my sister-in-law will be the first to let me know.
Congratulations on joining the vocal majority!
I doubt you’ll join the fastest growing group, the heads-down tribe, the smartphone addicts who hurt themselves and others.
Generally, I’m a big proponent of tapping into tribes to grow trust as explained in this post, http://connectconsultinggroup.com/involve-tribes-to-influence/
There are dangers with the heads-down tribe though….
Please keep us posted on how you acclimate to your smartphone.
wow, i’m impressed you actually did it. usually there would be 2 or 7 more discussions and arguments about it before you would actually pull the trigger. proud of you bro’. just think, now you can write blogs all day! from anywhere! on your phone! with your thumbs!