People can send you messages all the time, people you don’t even wanna hear from
How I fell out of love with texting
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How I fell out of love with texting
I turned off my notifications years ago. It was both a productivity hack and a sensory thing. When you work in a newsroom, pings and beeps and ringing and talking and typing are all part of the tapestry of noise. Working from a cafe, too, they’re not a problem. Here, they blend in with the scraping chairs, whirring coffee machines, bleeping of contactless payments, and social chatter. But working from home, every little sound becomes acute. The letterbox, a car door, the cat suddenly having some inscrutable argument with me about the deep unsuitability of his living conditions, despite the fact that he’s been happily asleep on the bed for the last hour. The clank of glass lets me know the neighbours are putting out their recycling. Beeping says the washing machine is done. Is that the side gate banging again? Who the fuck is drilling? I hear everything. In some ways you could argue it’s a form of mindfulness.
So my phone doesn’t beep. It doesn’t light up. Unless somebody literally calls me (in 2024?!) it just sits quietly, letting me know the time in a rotating selection of fonts and styles. Or, it would. I usually put it face down. But even as it sits, dark-screened and silent on the table next to my desk (not on my desk, that’s far too tempting), I can never uncouple myself from it entirely. I am never not aware of its presence, of my ability to pick it up and look at it. I both want this and do not want it. I want it because my phone is where my friends live, both the real ones and the social media ones. But I also do not want it. Because if I don’t look at my phone, I can stay here in this peaceful bubble, pretending that all I need to focus on is the task in front of me; this page, this essay, this newsletter.
As soon as I pick up my phone I see the green square with its perky little speech bubble. It promises fun and connection but I know that what it really brings is admin and overwhelm. Behind its innocent green facade are a whole host of Things I Have To Deal With.