Observations

Shutterstock photo by David C. Rehner.

Opening the Twitter app I showed him the video of the cat swatting at the birds through a kitchen window.

While out at the ferris wheel in Seattle we all posed for the most Instagrammable photo - all lights against a (semi-cloudy) night sky.

On Facebook, family members fought, with absolute ferocity, about why Trump should or shouldn’t be president in the comments section of a post I’d put up regarding a chickpea salad recipe. I deleted the post, embarrassed.

WhatsApp would have randos messaging me, and sometimes wanting to “face talk”.

Most of these instances happened years ago and yet, I stayed on.

Observation: Not having to be on your phone constantly nowadays feels like a privilege.

About two years ago I wrote a post entitled Is Social Media Serving Artists Or Starving Them? Just before writing it, I was struggling with my own inability to decide whether or not leaving such large social “networks” would cast a gaping hole in my world — my personal social world and the “art world” (for a lack of a better term).

Observation: Leaving (corporate) social media did leave a tiny hole but not as much as I originally thought it would and it was difficult at first. 

Just a couple of years ago, my first instinct was to go to my phone during commercials breaks, while waiting for my cleaning at the dentist’s, while sitting out in the sunshine(!), while waiting for a friend. To check the time. Checking all the social apps. It’s a hard habit to break and it took a good chunk of time for me to not do this.

When you aren’t scrolling through a preordained algorithm you’re, naturally, doing something (anything) else. Even if the new connection was getting to know my bedroom door knob a bit better. My brain rewired itself, it was very strange, and the time I spent in front of my phone is down to about 45 minutes a day from a height of about 4 hours a day (which, apparently is still not high from what I’ve read). Most of the time on my phone, nowadays, is spent answering family/friend messages, looking at the weather and driving directions. Having to look at a phone for the time was changed by getting an analog watch. I bought a compact digital camera with the intention of taking photos with it instead of my phone, but I’m still working on making the full switch. Slowly over time, while waiting for appointments or a coffee order, I naturally stopped pulling out the little black mirror and would people-watch instead. It’s oddly more entertaining.

My anxiety over the last two years, despite… everything, is quite low to non-existent with only an occasional flare-up. When scrolling, news bites get through regardless of settings so when the news would bloom and catch fire, so did my anxiety.

The phone is left at home more, especially if I’ll be with someone that will have one on them while we’re out. Less weight, physically and mentally. 

It’s a process. I’ll stick with it.

Photo: David C. Rehner