One of my most perplexing relationships is with my smartphone. In the morning, it updates me on the day’s weather. It keeps me organized and allows me to instantly share my thoughts on social media. Email and the latest news are just finger taps away. My phone lets me capture pictures and video that my own parents often missed when I was growing up.
My smartphone transforms me into both a mobile mom and mompreneur. People like me assume we’re more efficient, not tied to an office or glacier-sized desktop computer.
But my smartphone is also sending me warning signals. Something seems off when three people in a conference room waiting for a meeting to start are staring down at their phones and not talking to each other. As a passenger in a car, watching the world pass by through a window is replaced by technology in my hands challenging me to make the most of my travel time. And it’s as if Twitter keeps talking to me, calling me over to ensure I don’t miss the latest update of the movie or TV show someone I barely know is watching. When your child says put down the phone, you know a 12 step program might not be far behind.
I’m able to write this now because I have my smartphone away from home. But I don’t want to become a smartphone zombie, staring into a small screen while real life, even in its simplest forms, swirls around me. Sometimes I wish I was strong enough to dump the data plan and breathe in some nature. Am I really more efficient because I read email and Facebook faster?
The answer is probably a compromise, pushing the push notifications away during certain times a day. But I’m not so smart. This relationship keeps reeling me in with its apps, alerts and longer battery life. We need to spend more time apart, but these phones are so brainy and beautiful, it’s hard to break up even for a few hours.