I'm a Sucker For My Cell Phone

Puppies, babies and lollipops.  I used to wake up in the morning and be greeted by three little kids, those early hours spent making breakfast, packing lunches, ensuring backpacks were ready to go.  Before heading to work I'd take the time to walk my kids to elementary school, interact with their teachers, chat with fellow parents who were also neighbors.

Now mornings may find me arising to an electronic alarm.  Those salad days of analog clocks with a real bell long gone.  I used to open my front door and grab the local paper off my porch.  News is now delivered via internet and NPR.  When I was a greenhorn, a new Front Range arrival, the Denver Post was printed twice daily and the Rocky Mountain News was still a rival for my quarter and attention.  I'd hang out in bed with my husband on Sunday mornings, newspaper in one hand, coffee in the other.  My cup, a gift from my ex, proclaimed I was 'the cream in his coffee'.

Today I struggle with an addiction to my phone.  I self impose rules like no phone till after my first cup.  No FaceBook until I've written my morning pages.  But it is just me regulating me, so if I falter the only admonishment is in my head.   When I read statistics of how much time teenagers spend on-line, I check myself. I admit that I exist in an emotional vortex that spins between being a grown-up, and acting like a young adult who has only known this.  This electronic deluge.  This use of the phone for everything from directions to opinions.  This looking down, straining the muscles in the back of my neck.  Using my mid-life roll, what the teens call a muffin-top, as a handy shelf for my forearms to rest, allowing me to stand comfortably with my technological companion.

I pride myself on never having played a video game, and easily blame the proliferation of this pastime as a contributor to the violence of today.  But I don't really know.  It is pure conjecture; an opinion formed from reading and observation.  Is that how most suppositions come to be?  Is what we espouse really a value judgment, something carefully researched and pondered?  Or is it merely the meme du jour, featuring a well-known person who probably never said what is being purported, but hey - who needs fact checking - when we can just scroll down...

What can I do today?  How can I enjoy a baby, a puppy or a lollipop?  Metaphorically or in actuality. I can be kind to everyone I meet.  A smile costs me nothing, and will help to imprint a pleasant facial expression into my onslaught of wrinkles.  I can tell puppies that I see on the trail they are good dogs. Enjoy the licks and puppy love that seems so easy and free for a canine to deliver.  I can engage with my grandson who I rocked as a newborn while repeating just one word over and over.  Love.  I can carry that simple sentiment to all the children I see.  The littles running around a large tree in the courtyard of the Rec Center.  The kids in cute basketball jerseys every Saturday morning at the YMCA.  I can show them there are adults who pay attention to them, even if only for one concentrated moment.  Sans phone and device competition.  I can look for the sweetness in everyday life.  The brilliant Colorado sunshine. Cottonwoods on the trail that have endured cycles of drought and flood.  A meal with a friend, hands touching across the table, tears from laughter trickling down our cheeks.

Today instead of pressing a thumbs up and liking people on FB, I am going to enjoy people in real time.  The young man who scans my key tag at the Y.  My Pilates instructor who knows my body and makes accommodations to the workout.  The clerk at the store who is instructed to ask if I found everything OK.  Yes - I can find everything OK.

Today, I am not out to change the world one smile at a time.  I can only change myself.  My habits.  My interactions.  What will you change today?

Time to Write,

Jane