Permission To Be Unavailable
The intersection of connection and technology is amazing. Cellphones and an endless network of cellular towers. Public wifi networks at every coffee shop, restaurant and even on airplanes. We all carry a smart phone around like our lives depend on it, and even elementary-aged kids have a cellphone in their pockets.
We can be connected all the time, whether it’s our preference or not. It’s endlessly incredible. And deeply heartbreaking.
I remember a time when carphones were only for the the business person on the go. When cellphones were big and bulky, both new and rare. It was a different world. We had a home phone line, we helped record the answering machine message, and we looked up our friend’s phone numbers in the white pages. I remember when we got dial-up home internet. And that we were one of the first houses in the neighborhood with such a novel innovation.
My childhood happened when the digital age and connectivity were in their toddler years. Before age ten, life was always playing outside until dark with the other neighborhood kids. You might call your friend to see if they were home, or you’d just ride your bike around checking out the parks to see who you could find. Our house didn’t have cable or air conditioning. But we had a basketball hoop, skip-its, and an endless supply of sidewalk chalk.
It wasn’t until middle school when we chatted with our friends on instant messenger and chain letters turned into chain emails. It was an age when online connection tied up the phone line. You were at the mercy of parental restrictions, or you snuck onto the internet when they didn’t know. Busy signals were common when you made a phone call. If you heard one more than twice, you’d put on your rollerblades and go see if your friend was home instead.
Digital connection was innovative and exciting. It was present, but it still wasn’t the norm. A kid’s cellphone access lived in a drawer in the kitchen. It could make phone calls, send texts with T9 Word, and had a rudimentary game or two preloaded. You were given use of it primarily for emergencies. And maybe occasionally so you could let your parents know when the middle school basketball game was over in case you needed a ride home.
I grew up in the generation that was slowly introduced to the internet. We had computer labs in our elementary school libraries and in middle school we learned how cool it was to Ask Jeeves. In high school, we could proficiently find a book in the library using the Dewey Decimal System or search the online databases for our research papers.
I didn’t know at the time it was a balance I’d be grateful for. I didn’t know I was experiencing a whole childhood with one foot steady on solid ground in two worlds. Just as comfortable with the ever expanding digital influence in our daily lives as I was without it. I didn’t know at the time how tightly I’d cling to remembering the balance.
The consistent connectivity we have today didn’t happen all at once. It built up slowly and sometimes suddenly, while we walked around with a flip phone in our pockets and a digital camera looped around our wrists. We embraced it all as it happened: One change at a time.
Today it can be hard to imagine the world eighteen years ago. A time when you still needed a college email address to have a Facebook account. A time when you probably had a phone in your pocket, but you needed a computer to check your email. When no one expected that you’d always be available or in a position where you’d respond within minutes.
Constant connectivity has given us freedoms and tethers that we could’ve never imagined. We can go virtually anywhere and still have the ability to respond at our fingertips. But that also means we can be available when we are virtually anywhere. When we want to disconnect for a few days or five minutes, it has to be a conscious choice. The further technology reaches, the further we need to run to find the places where we can hide.
The thing is, we don’t have to always be reachable. Even when our phone has a signal. We can give ourselves permission to be unavailable.
We don’t have the same luxury that we used to. Our availability isn’t dictated by as far as the phone cord reaches or by whether we sign up for time in the computer lab. But our availability is our choice, and we can choose to be less available whenever we need to.
