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This week: SHOULD YOU GET RID OF YOUR IPHONE? Let’s discuss.
Time Travel
The year is 2004.
Shrek 2 is the most popular movie in the world, Jude Law is People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, Paris Hilton is the moment, and you and every other girlie who knows what’s what owns at least 3 pairs of UGGs, which you wear rain or shine, with capri pants or skorts. You have a crush on a boy with flippy skater-hair who plays tackle football and wears ironic T-shirts with an armful of Livestrong bracelets.
It’s 7:56 AM. You’re running late for school and your mom is PISSED. You slept through your alarm because were up until the wee hours of the morning playing Warioland 4 on your recently unearthed GameBoy Advance because you don’t have the Nintendo DS yet. Judging by how pissed your mom is, you’re never gonna get that DS.
You flip open your ugly-but-functional Samsung flip phone wishing it were a Motorola Razr. That’s what the cool girls have but ugh they’re so expensive. They just came out this year. Note to self: You want a Razr more than the DS. You’ll ask for that for Christmas, which can never come soon enough. From your flip phone, you text your friend Krista to stall your first period teacher Mr. S so that he doesn’t notice when you roll in late. C u soon!
You slap your phone closed and—that’s it. That’s the last time you use your phone. For hours. You don’t even think about your phone ‘til after school, when your mom is running late with your post-class-pre-soccer-practice snack (a Noah’s cinnamon raisin bagel with extra cream cheese, always). You call her in hungry hurry and slap your phone closed again.
Other than a text or two, there are no notifications to check.
Your phone is not an extension of you. It is a device.
Without a phone as important as one of your limbs… were you more you back then?
Welcome to Dumbwireless
Do you remember the day you became dumb?
Maybe it wasn’t one day so much as it was a succession of years spent staring into the white hot sun of your phone screen, searing your eyeballs like salmon steaks. The smarter our phones get… the dumber we do.
“After almost two decades with iPhones, the public seems to be experiencing a collective ennui with digital life. So many hours of each day are lived through our portable, glowing screens, but the Internet isn’t even fun anymore. We lack the self-control to wean ourselves off, so we crave devices that actively prevent us from getting sucked into them,” says Kyle Chayka, in his article “The Dumbphone Boom Is Real” (The New Yorker).
Chayka’s story covers couple Will Stults and Daisy Krigbaum, two LA-based twentysomethings so fed up with their iPhone addictions that they opted to trade their smartphones for so-called “dumb phones”—low-tech devices with no high-res screen, app store, and camera. Phones that are phones and not much more. Imagine that. They found it hard to weigh their options, so they created a business of their own called “Dumbwireless” to sell phones, data plans, and accessories for people who want to curb their sky-high screen time. Their home in East Hollywood functions as a “dumb phone emporium.” Some of their most popular phones, if you want to take a little peruse yourself, are:
The Light Phone, (pictured above, an e-ink device with almost no apps)
The Nokia 2780 (classic flip phone)
The Punkt (“a calculator-ish Swiss device that looks like something designed for Neo to carry in ‘The Matrix’” according to the article)
Now, smartphones aren’t all bad. I may be an extremist, but I’m not an absolutist. There is something to be said about having a world of knowledge of at your fingertips; I’m definitely smarter than I was in 6th grade with my sad little Samsung flip….
But. I’m increasingly addicted to the wrong stimuli on my phone, escaping knowledge in real time. Why would I stress myself out with news headlines when I could watch the same blonde woman on TikTok eat a burrito from tip to tip? I LOVE watching people eat food on the internet. Or… do I? Maybe I don’t. Maybe it actually makes me feel like I’ve wasted hours upon hours of my life, but I keep doing it because it triggers an extremely temporarily reward system in my little rat brain. You love burrito. Yum yum watch more video.
I live in a perpetual state of thinking I should know more about Palestine, abortion, the upcoming election—but how can I reach a quality baseline without my attention span curdling away like a paper from a flame? It’s the incessant muchness of the phone. I can’t inhale. Would it help to simplify my life? Buy a Light Phone and read the newspaper? Churn my own butter for good measure.
Yesterday, my boyfriend Nick asked me: “Have you heard about the beef between Kendrick Lamar and Drake?” and I said no. No, siree. Even hearing that sentence, beefbetweenkendrickanddrake makes my brain fizz; it reminds me why I am at capacity, always and forever. There are two many things to know, smart and dumb. Quantity over quality does not a smart boy make.
So am I going to get rid of my stupid smartphone? Can I part with the very device that both cripples and enables my existence in this modern world? Well, no. But! I’m willing to try what Chayka does at the end of the article:
“When I want to escape from my iPhone, I pop the sim card out (which, unfortunately, is not possible on some newer iPhones) and install it in a red Nokia 2780 flip phone—the closing snap of which brings me back instantly to my high-school days, when flip phones were cutting edge. After the surprisingly easy switching process, I take the simple device with me on my daily walks with my dog. If I had my smartphone in hand, I’d be refreshing Instagram or compulsively checking my e-mail while my hound does her business or sniffs tree trunks. With the Nokia, I’ve cut myself off from such meaningless digital stimuli but preserved my ability to answer texts or phone calls if necessary. (I’m too much of a millennial to actually leave the house without any phone.) I find myself looking more at my surroundings, which are particularly enjoyable in springtime, and I am more relaxed when I return from the excursions. When I switch the sim card back into my iPhone, the device seems momentarily absurd: an enormous screen filled with infinite entertainment and information that follows me wherever I go. Then I open all my usual apps in quick succession—e-mail, Instagram, Slack—to see what I’ve missed.”
I’ll let you know things go, after my iPhone only has split custody of my life.
And now… 5 Things From This Week That Made Me Remember Why I Like Being Alive
(5TTFTWTMMRWILBA for short)
A new addition to the Sunday Newsletter! Some good vibes to take into your week.
New York Times new game, Strands. Do I like it more than my one true love, Connections? Oof. Unpopular opinion, perhaps, to all of my Connections girlies out there. But it’s neck n’ neck.
I got a camera!!! I’m going to be recording a podcast that’s attached to this Substack starting in May, so I have a cute lil Sony AS7 to film some mic’ed up bits. Stoked to talk to you face to face. Well, my face to your… screen. Face to screen.
My mom told me to make a list of things I like about myself every day because I’ve been, howyousay, negative as hell lately. Her care makes me want to cry. It feels weird to write down I have a unusual brain that I love very much and also honestly great cheekbones, but it is helping me enjoy my days with more ease. So, try it. Be so bold to tell me what you love about yourself in the comments. I’m serious. Let us all celebrate you here at Great Job Inc.
All of Jordan Jensen’s comedy. Instagram clips, full YouTubed sets, doesn’t matter I’m there.
Interviewing my little bro for research on the movie I’m writing. I’m basing a character around him, which really is just a great excuse to call him more and get to know him better than I already do.
NEW STUFF COMIN UP!
Okay last thing then I’ll let you go. First of all thank you for being a subscriber to this Substack, I love you and doing this and the community that’s gradually blossoming from this projects little petals 🥹
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Til next week xx
nat