Notoriously bad at responding to texts in any reasonable timely matter; keeping contact with me in considerably hard. In the past two years, I have been traveling fairly consistently, and changing to an international phone number every few months only compounds the matter. I have five or six different apps on my phone used to communicate in different ways to different people, some of which have notifications enabled, many of which do not.
Everyone knows this friend in their life, for the next few minutes they are called “demure” but blink a second too long, there’s a new trending word. If you don’t know this friend, then you are this friend. I’ve been referred to in some of my friend groups now as, “the who is always popping in and out”. (I very rarely give warning to upcoming visits and can recall on some occasions showing up and knocking on a door, some friends surprised I’m back in the country.)
The guilt I feel from failing to communicate with friends in the same city as me or to keep communication with a long-distance friend is there nonetheless. An anxious feeling arises slowly as you begin to question your ability to be a good friend. But this feeling isn’t entirely a shared human experience, is it? Born 30 years earlier, I wouldn’t have the capacity to engage in these thoughts, how could I possibly communicate with some of these people in the midst of traveling, I have no steady place to sleep, no routine or schedule to my life at the moment.
The first week of July; I woke up on my friend’s couch. It’s a Monday, and I’m in a town just outside of Paris, accessible via metro line 7. My friend is working from home, and I’ve been there since Saturday morning, and I’m starting to feel like I’m in the way, so I pack my two bags and leave. I take the metro into the Latin Quarter looking to buy some pastries for myself knowing I won’t be back in Paris for some time. My stomach is aching with hunger since I haven’t eaten anything for 24 hours as I ride into the city, but it becomes too much, I’m lightheaded and weak by the time I carry my two heavy bags up the two flights of stairs, and I’m staring at a hill that I don’t have the energy to climb, so I sit down in the plaza, fill up my water bottle and snack on a handful of nuts from my emergency trail mix (something I keep all the time in my bag while traveling). The first bakery I stop at doesn’t have the chausson aux pommes that I’m craving, but settle for a pain au chocolat. I have six hours to kill before my train leaves, but I’m very aware of how broke I am. I sit down for an espresso and wait.
My train, delayed an hour, arrives in Amsterdam after 11pm. I spent the train ride trying to get comfortable in any way but that doesn’t go as planned. The next morning, I’m repacking my bags and gathering things from another bag that had been stashed away at my girlfriend’s house. We ride with her dad from Amsterdam to the countryside to spend the night at her parent’s home. We get there and have a nice long dinner since I haven’t seen them for many months, so we spend time catching up, and I have some time to do laundry, just not enough time to dry it. We go to sleep early since we are waking up early, cramming our things in the car early in the morning.
We take turns driving and sleeping for ten hours, traveling from The Netherlands into Belgium, passing through Luxembourg (quick stop for cheap cigarettes), then cruising towards the south of France. By dinner time, we arrive in a small French town near Dijon to check into a hotel for the night and get dinner. The final leg of the drive is another six hours the next day before we finally arrive in Italy. Then, unpack and get groceries; what’s the plan for dinner tonight?
I have been indulging myself in a funny tradition for myself in the past year in which I begin every travel day by playing On the Road Again by Willie Nelson (coincidentally my sublease in New York is owned by the daughter of one of Willie Nelson’s touring guitarists). It’s a sobering tradition because of the number of times I’ve played it. Emphasis on “on the road AGAIN”, sounding more like a negative than a positive now, but still the song sets the tone. It reminds me to enjoy the traveling and to embrace the long journey as the thing that is special, a reminder to be in the moment, not eager for the destination.
I’ve clocked a ridiculous number of hours in the car this year, a number I wouldn’t like to know. And a number of hours that is astonishing for not even having my car in the same country as me for 6 months of that time. It’s my limbo, my purgatory, a place removed from reality as I can begin to feel trapped in eternity on the asphalt in front of me.
There isn’t anything too special about these four days of travel because it’s something I’m used to by now: packing my bags on the day and moving across the landscape towards another place to sleep for the night. But by the end of these travel days, I was in Italy with my girlfriend, who was ready to enjoy her vacation; she’s had been working and studying up until a few days ago. She wants to enjoy the beach, go to a nice café for a drink or two, and generally, just hang out with nothing on the schedule as you might do on vacation.
But I’m stressed because I haven’t opened my email in four or five days, I’ve fallen behind on some journaling and other things, my phone is filled with notifications that haven’t been responded to in a while. The little red circle with the number of unread text messages glares at me disapprovingly.
I sit down in a coffeeshop and open my laptop. I sit down with my phone as if I’m starting my business hours. I turn my attention to reading emails and responding to text messages. I’m able to focus and give full answers to the people I care about.
I’ve struggled to maintain any sort of routine in a long time since I hardly spend more than a few days in any one place, but I’ve developed small habits to give myself some sense of sanity. I’ve worked hard to carve out time for myself to do the small things that most people do somewhere in their daily routine.
I’ve had no home, no bed for myself in months, and I’ve consistently spent nights with friends on couches. The consequences of this means there is no room to go to and close the door when you’ve become too tired to socialize. I mean, they are letting me stay with them for free, I can’t not talk with them. There’s no space at all that’s mine and mine alone, as I am only borrowing their kitchen or their shower.
In the morning, I’ll make it to the library- oh the libraries in Paris, the really old ones with the tall ceilings, that give off a holy feeling in the space. The ones that are so quiet that a sniffle across the room makes you flinch. It’s spiritual, and I open up my notebook, where I left off yesterday to read the last few paragraph that I had written. This is my alone time, present in the space around me and present with myself. I can stare up at the ceiling, thinking about things, reflecting on conversations I’ve had recently or things I’ve read. Then, my phone buzzes, the screen lights up, my eyes can’t stop themselves from flicking over instantly, and my hand jolts forward without thought.
A text from a friend; wait, stop, don’t respond now, you just sat down, don’t start a conversation when you are trying to focus…okay just read it. done. Now my thumb has found its natural course to opening my email; nothing new in the last ten minutes (of course!!). Then, suddenly: woah, how did Instagram get opened? Oh shit, new DM from Liam… okay this one is kinda funny. And then….
**tv static**
..
..
.. Holy shit this is stupid, the internet is so stupid, why the hell am I still scrolling?
FUCK!
The library, the tall ceilings, the silence, and the notebook in front of me. I put my phone back down and try to focus. It’s all there, still all around me.
I think there’s a feeling that sometimes there is more going on in your phone than the world around you, or at least that’s what we tell ourselves. We can think that the things happening on our phone are happening in the same space as us, but that’s not true.
I cannot continue to think that everyone in my phone and every notification I get is somehow crashing into the real world and taking more importance. These things in our pocket are only resources for interacting with the real world.
SO- I’ll call you when I get to a pay phone, I’ll write you when I can sit down at my desk and find a postage stamp, gimme a few days but we can get together and talk at a coffee shop sometime.
People don’t hear from me too much anymore. I don’t respond to texts very much and a lot of calls go to voicemail, but I don’t think I’ve lost any friends. When I’m in the same city, we will see each other and I will enjoy quality time with you because I won’t be on my phone texting someone else. I will be here, present with you.
Other people seem to desire something similar; my friends Griffin and Tyler are exploring the topic as well.
This is the first installment of a series of articles to examine my relationship with my phone and the effects of modern technology. I am hoping to publish pieces weekly on the issue; I’m interested now in why everything feels so empty…?
real