Member-only story
A couple of weeks ago, my student stole my phone right in front of me. I wrote about the experience extensively here, but during the whole process and ordeal, I didn’t have a phone for approximately 24 hours. I quickly learned the extent to which we rely on our phones on a daily basis, or at least the extent to which I rely on my phone.
Fortunately, I still could communicate with a lot of my contacts through iCloud and through my Mac. But I could only get in contact with friends who also communicated through Apple products. Any of my friends that communicated with me through Android were not able to keep in touch with me at the time. When I got a new SIM card into a friend’s old iPhone 6, I saw multiple green texts on my phone that I had overlooked, friends who were looking for rides or asking questions that I completely didn’t see.
I instinctually grab towards my pocket to look at my phone frequently and check notifications. I did that all the time after my phone got stolen only to get reminded that I didn’t have a phone anymore. The response was so conditioned because I’m so used to relying on my phone for so many things, like updates on the news, alarms, music, checking my e-mail, social media, checking the weather, and you name whatever else. I…
