Sunday, August 02, 2009
Reach Out and Touch Someone
So, I did something Friday I haven't done in a while: I left for work and forgot my phone at home.
I realized it as soon as the elevator got to the ground floor, but knew my bus would be there in a minute and if I missed it, I'd need to drive to work, which means paying $14 for parking, and I'd rather not do that just to retrieve my phone. But I considered it...
It shouldn't be that big a deal. My office was designed in a way that I don't have phone coverage in there, so it's not like I keep it with me all the time. But I usually send a message or two while commuting to work, and I can step out during the day and check for calls or SMS I might have missed, or take a look at email or Facebook, two other things I don't have access to in my office. In fact, I had two messages in mind that I intended to send while riding the train, but they had to wait.
This, of course, was after I left my ATM card in a machine the previous evening. I cancelled it within 2 hours and now get to wait a week or more for a new one. It disturbs me when I get absentminded all of a sudden. I had a couple other things I forgot this weekend, too, and it always makes me nervous when that starts to happen. My identity is based on being "the smart guy" and if I lose that, I think I'm screwed, so anything going wrong in the brain really bothers me.
On the bus headed for the metro station I felt totally disconnected from the world, and that seems weird. I was surrounded by people on the bus, I was about to be surrounded by more people on the train, and of course I'm about the see my co-workers, yet I had a feeling I was cutoff. My guess is that the reason why is because those people who were physically around me aren't people whom I chose to have around me. The people I choose are the ones who happen to be on the other end of that phone, whether they're 10,000 miles away or 1 mile away.
I'm thinking that's one of the joys of our evolving technology: more choice in terms of who we keep as active parts of our lives. Moving away doesn't mean we have to drop people from our daily lives. Meeting someone while on vacation no longer has to be just a "one-time" thing but instead can lead to a lifelong friendship. Planning things with our local friends gets easier. We're no longer forced to include the people imposed upon us - co-workers, neighbors - in our lives simply in order to have someone to communicate with and have someone to talk to day-to-day. Instead, we have a choice. We can end relationships or we can maintain them, but we have more options now.
I like the choices I've made and I'm surrounded by some pretty great people even when they aren't right there next to me. So being out of touch with them, even for only 10 hours, shakes me up I guess.
I realized it as soon as the elevator got to the ground floor, but knew my bus would be there in a minute and if I missed it, I'd need to drive to work, which means paying $14 for parking, and I'd rather not do that just to retrieve my phone. But I considered it...
It shouldn't be that big a deal. My office was designed in a way that I don't have phone coverage in there, so it's not like I keep it with me all the time. But I usually send a message or two while commuting to work, and I can step out during the day and check for calls or SMS I might have missed, or take a look at email or Facebook, two other things I don't have access to in my office. In fact, I had two messages in mind that I intended to send while riding the train, but they had to wait.
This, of course, was after I left my ATM card in a machine the previous evening. I cancelled it within 2 hours and now get to wait a week or more for a new one. It disturbs me when I get absentminded all of a sudden. I had a couple other things I forgot this weekend, too, and it always makes me nervous when that starts to happen. My identity is based on being "the smart guy" and if I lose that, I think I'm screwed, so anything going wrong in the brain really bothers me.
On the bus headed for the metro station I felt totally disconnected from the world, and that seems weird. I was surrounded by people on the bus, I was about to be surrounded by more people on the train, and of course I'm about the see my co-workers, yet I had a feeling I was cutoff. My guess is that the reason why is because those people who were physically around me aren't people whom I chose to have around me. The people I choose are the ones who happen to be on the other end of that phone, whether they're 10,000 miles away or 1 mile away.
I'm thinking that's one of the joys of our evolving technology: more choice in terms of who we keep as active parts of our lives. Moving away doesn't mean we have to drop people from our daily lives. Meeting someone while on vacation no longer has to be just a "one-time" thing but instead can lead to a lifelong friendship. Planning things with our local friends gets easier. We're no longer forced to include the people imposed upon us - co-workers, neighbors - in our lives simply in order to have someone to communicate with and have someone to talk to day-to-day. Instead, we have a choice. We can end relationships or we can maintain them, but we have more options now.
I like the choices I've made and I'm surrounded by some pretty great people even when they aren't right there next to me. So being out of touch with them, even for only 10 hours, shakes me up I guess.
