A STATE OF PHONELESSNESS

I’m surviving. No phone for twenty-four hours. Okay, twenty, but I’m rounding up. Allow me that.

 

It’s not like I lost it in the nether regions of my condo and couldn’t find it despite lifting sofa pillows repeatedly, as if the phone would suddenly appear on the tenth time, finally giving up on Hide and Seek after no one found it. (Forgive me. I’m still working through some childhood trauma.) I didn’t go to a bar and forget it along with my coat and all sensibilities, whereby I had to wait until the next evening for the bars to reopen. (I’m classy. I don’t frequent joints that open at seven in the morning.) 

 

I willingly surrendered my phone, not because I was texting while inexplicably walking the halls of a high school, nor because an usher accosted me while I was in the midst of live-streaming a touring production of “Hello, Dolly!” starring, neither Barbra nor Bette, but a lip-synching Paris Hilton. (Shudders.) I wasn’t misbehaving but my phone was.   

 

My screen cover cracked on the weekend. Again. Not from a pratfall this time on one of my jogs when I forget to call out “Left foot, right foot” in my head. I don’t even have a story to go with the damaged screen like when last time, an occasion which warrants its own side story.

 

Eldfell. So stunning!

I didn’t fix the phone for months after that incident because it reminded me, fondly, of Iceland and, not so fondly, of the ensuing credit card debt I was still paying off. The damage was done on the island of Heimaey, a short ferry ride from the southwest coast of the mainland. I’d already hiked around the crater of Eldfell, which had erupted in 1973, and, although there was no danger whatsoever, I was feeling emboldened—The Volcano Conqueror!—so I decided to climb Heimaklettur (Home Rock) to get an Instagram-worthy shot of the harbor and the town of Vestmannaeyjar. (As if randomly pointing my phone in any direction at any point in time in Iceland didn’t offer a breathtaking shot. Too much beauty can make a person greedy.) 

 

What's a little climb?

AllTrails listed it as a hike, just a tad over a mile, “out and back,” which should have been described as “up and down.” Somehow, I’d overlooked the classification of the hike climb as “hard” and the notation that it takes seventy-five minutes. I stopped several times as I ascended one rock face after another, sometimes with assists from chains, sometimes with seemingly well-secured ladders with most of the rungs still in place. The winds intensified with the elevation and I had to keep batting away the sudden onset of a previously undetectable fear of heights. 

Deceptive photo...makes it look doable!

 

It was humbling when I had to step aside on a tiny ridge to let a rugged man pass me by, the only other “hiker” I saw on this dubious jaunt. This guy was stern, seemingly irked he’d had to wait as I suppressed the urge to whimper as I made it up another ladder to get to the precarious ridge. I suppose I should have been grateful he’d shown restraint, suppressing his own urge to reach up and toss me off. (No investigation would have resulted after my body was eventually found. Tsk, tsk. Another hiker out of his element.)

 

Full disclosure: This man, who may have actually been part mountain goat, was seventy-something. Hardy stock in Iceland.

 

I tried to conjure up warmth in this man who came off as even harsher than the conditions. I imagined he had a pet—a golden retriever since they have the best temperament, something to offer balance. He’d tried to bring Fido along in the past, but the damn dog couldn’t navigate the ladders any better than me. No walk for you! 

 

Apologies. I may be stereotyping an Icelander with an East German stereotype. Plus, a smidgen of Soup Nazi. If I say some of my best friends are German, that makes it all okay, right?

 

Turns out you can Google the 
view from the top. It'll do.
(Dare I say that's me in the pic?)

Long story, barely shortened, my phone screen cracked on my descent, after the old man—hell, let’s say he was prematurely gray at twenty-two—shook my attempt to follow and I glanced downward—waaaaay downward—another time and was overwhelmed with all-out panic. Get. The. Fuck. Down. 

 

And don’t you dare glance down again until your feet are flat on the empty parking lot. 

 

(Yes, empty. That should’ve been a sign.)

 

With the wind whipping against my body, my jacket banged against a ladder and my phone inside a pocket didn’t take kindly to high altitude turbulence. I only learned this after I knelt to the ground—it may have been involuntary, shaky legs and all—and kissed that dang parking lot. I never got that Insta shot. The cracks were the Icelandic souvenir I didn’t actually want but better than a broken neck.

 

The story behind the damaged screen this time around is much shorter. I walked two blocks to grab a morning coffee, phone in my jean pocket. When I pulled it out as I waited for my oat milk latte, it was cracked, cause unknown. Static cling? Melee with lint? Being as it’s an iPhone 6, I suspect some IT staffer programmed it to self-destruct. Mission aborted? I shall not cave and buy a new phone. What are we at now anyway…iPhone 137? 

 

I dropped off my phone at a rogue repair shop that operates out of a closet with street access. It was refreshing to step in and not be swarmed by Apple employees trying to meet their sales quotas. (“May I recommend the iPhone 137+!?” For clarity, I should note that the exclamation mark is part of the name.) The guy didn’t even look up from behind the Plexiglass—not a COVID vestige, but a bulletproofing measure to deter Apple IT mobsters. I passed my phone through the slot. “Come back tomorrow,” the man said. At least, I think it was a man, going solely on the low register of the voice. The closet was dimly lit for obvious reasons.

 

I exited, phoneless. Without my device in either palm, my hands shook. Get it together, I told myself. First world problem. But is it? The homeless people I pass on Hastings Street have phones. I’ll bet Apple air-dropped phones on North Sentinel Island, described as the place where the “most isolated tribe in the world” lives. It’s part of Apple’s recycle/reuse program, a place to dump some of those iPhone 6’s that everyone but me has deemed passé.

  

I needed distraction. I went on a bike ride. Ninety minutes is standard but I couldn’t keep track of time to report because, you know, no phone. (Where did I put my grandfather’s pocket watch?) I’m going to say it was my fastest ride ever. Longest, too. Take my word for it. Thank you for the enthusiastic congratulations.

 

Deep Cove, my destination, was stunning, as always. I wanted to take a photo which I would delete three weeks later when I’d realize it looked exactly like the four dozen Deep Cove photos I’ve taken before but, sans phone, I just had to take in the beauty for myself. Nothing for Facebook. Boring, eh? At least I won’t have to waste ten seconds deleting pics when my phone runs out of storage. Again. I’ll throw in that I saw a pod of orcas and a stunning sunset as I pedalled over the Second Narrows Bridge while heading home. You’ll just have to trust me. I gloried in my newfound state of being in the moment.

 

As the repair shop’s opening neared, I found myself more than surviving. Thoughts of my phone still shaped my behavior. I’d pat my pockets, then glance on the kitchen counter. Yep, no phone. While walking to the shop, I stopped in front of an abstract alley mural, ready for a selfie moment only to laugh at my silliness. The mural clashed with my coat. I reached for my phone to get fifty cents off my latte with my coffee app. Shrug. The savings wouldn’t have made a dent in my Icelandic debt. I thought of texting a couple of friends to grab a coffee since the repair shop is in the area. Whatever. I’m really not that social. I couldn’t check the hourly weather. It’s currently sunny in Vancouver so, obviously, that wouldn’t last since it’s still March. I could always check the sky instead of my phone. A little neck strain, doing things old-fashioned, but nothing to send me to Emergency. I could wait until my next concussion from smashing my head on an open cupboard. That’s pretty common, isn’t it?

 

Thinking of this pigeon lady I saw

in a Manhattan park years ago.

These birds are handmade. 

Could become my new hobby if I

remained phoneless, but mine 

would be balls of gray felt. 

I'm not that crafty. 

Being sunny, I sat on a bench in a park and watched the pigeons. “Rats with wings,” a friend of mine used to say. They’re all right though. Were they mooching like a hopeful basset hound? A couple of the birds concerned me, their feet seemingly deformed as they favored one over the other. I’d post a pic on Twitter to get people to weigh in—a new plague, someone would likely say. That might evolve into all kinds of doom. Perhaps being phoneless, I’ve spared countless people from a sudden anxiety spike. To my three followers in Egypt which is apparently the world titleholder for Most Pigeons, you’re welcome. Live in peace.  

 

Think I’ll hit another café, fit in another writing session. I’m feeling uncharacteristically focused, phone-free, boosted by a natural surge of Vitamin D, better connected to nature and all. The shop is open till five. Turns out the phone can wait.