How many times in your life has Murphy’s Law proven you spectacularly wrong? This time it really got me.

A few months ago I wrote a post about which modern gadgets I genuinely need and which I could live without.

Since I also work professionally in the analysis of new media – and my current focus is particularly on how smartphones function and our relationship with them – I was convinced that my own example could help shift the perception of how necessary they really are to us. Or aren’t.

I had never considered myself particularly attached to that little device, and was confident I could live without it at any time. Murphy got his fingers in it, as he always does, and managed to prove me wrong in a very short space of time. This story has two sides, as stories always do.

So – a month ago my mobile phone, or “smartphone,” broke. Nothing dramatic: send it off for repair and the problem is solved.

How will I live without it? Easily and without any problems!

I have a laptop, I have a landline – so anyone who needs to find me in an emergency can. And that’s exactly how it went. I had no cravings or crises over the phone or social media. I used email as always, and truly everyone who wanted to reach me and found it strange that I wasn’t answering calls or messages managed to contact me by email.

I was in touch with Marko and my family exclusively through the laptop too, and it worked perfectly.

Without a Phone? Easy!

But what about when I wasn’t at my computer? That’s when I bravely said to myself and others: “How did we manage more than ten years ago when nobody had a mobile phone – and we still made plans and sorted everything out just fine?!” And it worked. I even felt a little proud that in the 21st century, a smartphone wasn’t essential to my daily life.

It was actually easier in one respect – while writing my Master’s thesis, there was no longer that little worm in my head compelling me to glance at the small device called a phone every few minutes. I noticed that my concentration lasted not only considerably longer, but was also qualitatively better.

Days passed, then weeks, and still no sign of my phone. And life didn’t stop.

Murphy Had Other Plans

And then came the sobering situation I had been firmly convinced I’d avoid. But Murphy had other plans for my ideals – involving Sofia, naturally.

DSC03073

What happens when technology makes us fail at the thing that matters most – parenting?

One of the big events in kindergartens here in Bavaria is the feast of St. Martin. The kindergartens organise celebrations that whole families attend. The children are especially excited about it, because they make their own paper lanterns, which they carry around the kindergarten with their families as darkness falls – and then, as is tradition, celebrate together inside with food and drinks.

The celebration was at dusk, around 4pm. And Sofka’s kindergarten normally runs until 3:30pm. That day I stayed home to write, and Marko dropped her off.

Everything went as usual – except for the fact that we were supposed to pick her up at noon, and we didn’t. Too late now to point fingers: we didn’t ask, and the teachers didn’t flag it.

So Marko went as usual at around 3pm – and was shocked. Not a single child besides Sofka was still in the kindergarten. All the staff were setting up for the celebration, and one teacher was with Sofka (who, thankfully, was asleep when Marko arrived).

The kindergarten had called me when they realised we weren’t coming on time – I didn’t answer. As if by irony, I had told one of the teachers just a week earlier that I had no phone, and if they needed anything, they should call Marko. They couldn’t find Marko’s number, and Sofka was left in the kindergarten – because we were the only ones who hadn’t come to collect her.

There are no words for the despair and sadness we felt afterwards. Thankfully the teachers were wonderful – they didn’t hold it against us and admitted that part of the misunderstanding was also on their side, and there was no need to worry.

The Sad Truth of the 21st Century

But! How do you not worry? How do you not ask yourself – what if, God forbid, something serious had happened, what if she had been hurt or a thousand other things, and they simply couldn’t find us, because I didn’t have a bloody phone…

No, this isn’t a story about what bad parents we are (though I do feel that way). And it’s not a story about a system that doesn’t work.

This is the sad truth: that in the 21st century, whether we want to admit it or not, it simply isn’t possible to be unreachable and not have a phone on you. Frightening, I know – but that’s how it is.

From that day on, I will no longer be an advocate for the idea that we can manage without mobile phones – at least not to the same degree as before. Life proves us wrong at every turn, and everyone learns from their own mistakes.

What kind of phone we have doesn’t matter, whether it’s cheap or expensive, what it can or can’t do. The device itself can be neither good nor bad – what matters is how and what we use it for.

I now have a new phone (thank God for Amazon), the old one is still being repaired. And no, I don’t have to use it for everything and everyone – but for my family, especially for Sofia, I need to be reachable always and everywhere. Ideals can wait – or change.

S-Mama