Affair

I am involved in a very serious, very passionate, incredibly torrid love affair. We spend literally every waking moment within arm's reach of each other, and every night we rest contentedly with our faces several inches apart. Oh yes...the passion that exists between myself and my cell phone is unmatchable. I will, however, admit to being almost as in love with my laptop. But my laptop doesn't fit so snugly in my pocket (or sitting in my bra on vibrate if I'm out somewhere loud...this would be where the physical intimacy gets exciting.) Some call it an obsession, but I prefer to think of it as a glorious romance. I get angry it, I've carelessly tossed it aside, it frustrates me...but every ounce of pain becomes worth it as soon as I hear those beautiful digital chimes letting me know that someone has text messaged me. Or that someone is calling me. Or perhaps I've even gotten a picture message. Oh yes...it's hot.

As most of you know, I'm currently in grad school pursuing my MFA in Creative Writing Nonfiction. I have a piece that will be due for my classmates in about a week, and I thought that an intriguing experiment to write about would be to turn off my cell phone and unplug my laptop for 48 hours. I'll pause and give you a moment to think about the implications this might have for me. Me...the girl who can text at the speed of light, who probably receives 10 e-mails, 20 phone calls, and possibly over 100 text messages every day. The girl who gets concerned voice mails left for her if she doesn't pick up her phone. Ok, now that you've hopefully digested the severity of this experiment, I'll give you another moment to laugh at me.

So, I've spent the past month trying to figure out what weekend would be the best weekend in which to unplug myself. The issue...I couldn't find a weekend! I couldn't stand the thought of not waking up to "good morning" text messages from the boy or falling asleep to "xoxo" lit up brightly on my screen. However, after a month of trying to plan a weekend, I finally settled on this past one. Sadly, it didn't pan out. It worked for a few hours, until I got to the Open House I had to run on campus Saturday and realized that 40 of my students were relying on being able to text me throughout the program with questions and to get directions. So I gave up before I started. I think Freud would have something to say about my subconscious here, but I'm going to ignore that.

What I think I'm going to have to do is run this experiment during the week. I'll have to leave my cell phone off and unplug my laptop...and during work hours only answer my work phone and check my work e-mail. There's got to be a way to disable gmail, right?

I'm still completely panicked. But alas, I'll move forward. It's for the sake of art, right? And to test my sanity...but hopefully I'll look back on this and laugh!

xoxo