So, I Get A Smart Phone

Actually, I was given one last week.  But instead of throwing up my hands, I say, “Thank you”, and begin a 21^st century adventure.

Catherine offers to go with me to the phone store.

“Hi!  Are you coming with a plan already or are you switching plans?”, the nice young woman at the desk asks.

“Well, um…”

“Well, actually, he’s brand new, starting from scratch”, Catherine interjects.

“Yah, I really haven’t had a cell phone before…”

“Well welcome to the 21^st century!”, the sales rep beams and shakes my hand.

She kindly helps me through my questions, “How do you turn it off?”  (Answer:  you don’t.)

She assures me that typing with one finger is just fine.  In the end she pauses, “I don’t think I’ve actually ever met someone who didn’t have a cell phone before…”

I smile.

As she holds open the door for us, she notes, “I’ll be sending you a text with a survey attached.  I’d sure appreciate it if you’d put in a good word about the service you received.”

I think:  I’d be glad to but how in the world will I know that I have received a text – and what do I do if I get one?

In the past week, I have learned many things:

1)      How to type.  (Still with one finger.)

2)     How to take a picture.  (Not by looking through that small hole in the back of the camera as I realized.  That is actually the lens.  I am glad no one was looking when I tried that.)

3)     How to get directions.  (I was only honked at once because I was looking at my cell phone screen to tell me where to go when I already knew perfectly well how to get there.  “Continue down NE 45^th Street, turn left at 16^th Avenue NE.”

4)    Get the weather report.  (However contrary to what my phone said it was not actually “41 degrees and raining” but in fact “snowing” on View Ridge on Saturday morning.)

5)     Answer the phone.  (Just start talking. Yelling into the phone is actually not necessary.)

6)    Make a phone call.  (Do not wait for the dial tone, cell phones don’t have dial tones.  Do not randomly push at the screen like I did last Sunday morning or you may end up phoning Catherine at 5:15 a.m.   I think it only rang once and she assured me that she was up already.)

7)     Oh yes, and I did get the text and survey from the phone company and successfully gave the sales rep a 10 star rating.

Whether all of this knowledge has actually made me any “smarter” waits to be seen.

The same day I got my smart phone, I was sent an article, “The Joy of Quiet” (New York Times, January 1, 2012) by Pico Iyer who, alas, does not have cell phone and reflects on the effect they have on those of us who do.

Iyer notes that the average American spends at least eight and a half hours a day in front of a screen.  In fact the number of hours that American adults spent online doubled between 2005 and 2009. The average office worker today has not more than three minutes at a time at his or her desk without interruption.  Three minutes?   Good heavens.

So, his point:  How amidst all that noise do we actually have the time and space to slow down and think.  With “breaking news” coming at us perpetually along with images of Suzy’s last vacation, the phone ringing, and an email message flashing, we don’t have time to reflect and be present with any of it.

“The central paradox of the machines that have made our lives so much brighter, quicker, longer and healthier is that they cannot teach us how to make the best use  of them; the information revolution came without an instruction manual.”

So here is where I come in on my new 21^st century adventure: I want to pay attention to how to use this new technology, keep my sanity, and have time in my day to still do nothing at all.

A teen reflected recently after a week on a retreat where no plug-in-your-ears technology was allowed, “I never knew that there was a voice in my head.”

I never want to forget that there is.  And although I believe that God can certainly speak though cell phones as God does through everything else, I don’t want to forget to listen using the primary tool I have to connect with God (my own body and mind.)

So, I want to learn to live in paradox.  To be a contemplative with a smart phone. And no, while I’m not giving up my little red notebook and pen (I’ll always write faster than I type and besides I love my little red notebook), I also want to learn to use a 21^st century tool in ways that can actually be helpful in my life.      

So here I am, the man who never wanted a cell phone, having one and liking it.

And although he never imagined his words being used to speak of such things as cell phones and contemplation, I love the way forward that T.S. Eliot points for us all:

Old men ought to be explorers

Here and there does not matter

We must be still and still moving

Into another intenisty

For another union, a deeper communion

(T.S. Eliot, “East Coker”)

BZZZZ….BZZZZZ.  Incoming call.  Ah, that’s alright, let it go, it will click over to voice mail…..But, who was that calling? and at this hour?

Stay tuned.

And for now, tuning out.