Oh my God, I wrote last night to my ex-wife, I almost lost my phone! Again. Unbelievable. What's wrong with me?
MS was her reply.
Well, there you have it.
About this time last year, I lost my i-Phone. I was at the hospital at that time for a doctor appointment and apparently I just put the phone down somewhere. I have no recollection of whether I had left it on a chair, or with my bike, or somewhere in between. Nor did I ever recover that phone.
Ever since then, I have tried to be rather conscious of the phone's whereabouts, because not only are these things very expensive, but they are our connection to much of the world, an essential tool in our everyday lives. If one loses his phone, how, for instance, does he even alert anybody to the fact that he has lost his phone? The contacts are in the phone. The numbers are in the phone (certainly not in my brain). We are connected to the world through our phones. Yes, I can still tell Louis that I lost my phone via her email (using my laptop), but she, like many people, rarely even looks at e-mail anymore.
Well, last night I had decided to drive down to Sanur for a coffee. Strangely, I had a nagging feeling when I set out that this was somehow a bad idea. I usually don't go out at night anymore, but I guess I was just unusually bored last night.
I sat on the bench outside Starbucks for a little while with my coffee and my phone and my cigarettes (takeaway coffee of course, as lockdown is still in effect here), and then headed on home. It was only upon reaching my own front porch that I discovered the phone was not with me.
Instant panic.
Do you know how it feels? Like My God, I've somehow lost my right arm on the way home!
Give me back my golden arm.
How was this possible? Where in the world could it be? I checked the bike compartments about twenty times. I checked my pockets twenty times. No phone. And I became fairly certain that I must have put the phone in my back pocket (which I sometimes unwisely do) and it had surely fallen out on the road somewhere.
I knew it was not at Starbucks, but I raced back down to Sanur anyway. I could think of nothing else but two things: 1) That I was suddenly cut off from all vital connections and communications and 2) That my ex-wife was going to scream at me. (A non-Indonesian cannot buy a phone in Indonesia, by the way. He must have an Indonesian citizen buy it for him).
I knew, as I've said, that the phone was not at Starbucks ... and was therefore utterly shocked to find it sitting on the bench at Starbucks.
How is this possible?
Which leads me back to my original question. What's wrong with me?
But perhaps the more meaningful question is not 'What's wrong with me?' but 'How can I get around what's wrong with me?' Concentration, awareness, does not seem to be working. Shall I chain the phone to myself? I believe they sell chains that hook onto one's belt loop, right? Maybe that's the answer.
Then again … what if one forgets to put his pants on?
MS was her reply.
Well, there you have it.
About this time last year, I lost my i-Phone. I was at the hospital at that time for a doctor appointment and apparently I just put the phone down somewhere. I have no recollection of whether I had left it on a chair, or with my bike, or somewhere in between. Nor did I ever recover that phone.
Ever since then, I have tried to be rather conscious of the phone's whereabouts, because not only are these things very expensive, but they are our connection to much of the world, an essential tool in our everyday lives. If one loses his phone, how, for instance, does he even alert anybody to the fact that he has lost his phone? The contacts are in the phone. The numbers are in the phone (certainly not in my brain). We are connected to the world through our phones. Yes, I can still tell Louis that I lost my phone via her email (using my laptop), but she, like many people, rarely even looks at e-mail anymore.
Well, last night I had decided to drive down to Sanur for a coffee. Strangely, I had a nagging feeling when I set out that this was somehow a bad idea. I usually don't go out at night anymore, but I guess I was just unusually bored last night.
I sat on the bench outside Starbucks for a little while with my coffee and my phone and my cigarettes (takeaway coffee of course, as lockdown is still in effect here), and then headed on home. It was only upon reaching my own front porch that I discovered the phone was not with me.
Instant panic.
Do you know how it feels? Like My God, I've somehow lost my right arm on the way home!
Give me back my golden arm.
How was this possible? Where in the world could it be? I checked the bike compartments about twenty times. I checked my pockets twenty times. No phone. And I became fairly certain that I must have put the phone in my back pocket (which I sometimes unwisely do) and it had surely fallen out on the road somewhere.
I knew it was not at Starbucks, but I raced back down to Sanur anyway. I could think of nothing else but two things: 1) That I was suddenly cut off from all vital connections and communications and 2) That my ex-wife was going to scream at me. (A non-Indonesian cannot buy a phone in Indonesia, by the way. He must have an Indonesian citizen buy it for him).
I knew, as I've said, that the phone was not at Starbucks ... and was therefore utterly shocked to find it sitting on the bench at Starbucks.
How is this possible?
Which leads me back to my original question. What's wrong with me?
But perhaps the more meaningful question is not 'What's wrong with me?' but 'How can I get around what's wrong with me?' Concentration, awareness, does not seem to be working. Shall I chain the phone to myself? I believe they sell chains that hook onto one's belt loop, right? Maybe that's the answer.
Then again … what if one forgets to put his pants on?
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