Unfriending My Ex: And Other Things I'll Never Do Read Free Page B

a coastal flooding watch (is there always a coastal flooding watch? So confused about this) in my area.
    It had happened a million times before, but it didn’t matter. The off chance that the message could be exciting, dramatic, tragic, or life-changing (or from an ex!) was just too tempting and caused an almost-thirty-times-hourly “need” to check my phone. And so I welcomed my one-week switch from a smartphone to a landline. It was going to make me a better person, I was sure of it.
    Having a landline during my experiment didn’t only help with my ability to be present at dinners and meetings. I also found that there is a stark difference ihn talking on a landline compared to talking on a smartphone—that is, if one even talks on a smartphone at all and doesn’t just text. I found that the landline encouraged longer conversations. It also felt like a novelty, so in a way these conversations seemed more special. I was brought back to the days when I would lie on my bed and talk to my friends for hours on the phone. (Remember in the opening credits of Beverly Hills, 90210 when Kelly is lying and rolling on the bed on her landline?! Just like that! Except for the rolling part because no one does that! But you get what I’m saying.) Most importantly, I was less distracted because I didn’t have a multitude of messages coming and going across the screenwhile I tried to concentrate on what the person on the other end was saying. I forgot how exciting and lovely it could be when the phone would ring and it was a surprise to find out who was on the other end, how nice it was to hear my phone ring without getting a text beforehand that said Can I call you? (Is there a more ridiculous waste of time than that text? Isn’t the ring the universal symbol of Can I call you? ) I had to actually talk to people when they called, and I rediscovered how wonderful this kind of interaction could be. It was great to hear people’s reactions, rather than just read the haha or lol or imagine?! or omg what?! It was as if I had forgotten there was a living, breathing, feeling person behind those digital letters and emoticons. In only one week, these conversations strengthened my friendships with people with whom I usually communicated through text or social media.
    My evenings changed that week as well. In general, my nights usually consisted of a dinner and two or three stops afterward, at least two of which I would finalize over text once I was already out (if I was drinking, I would make plans to go to five and end up at one plus the Pisa Pizza around the corner from my apartment). But during my experiment, I made one plan, confirmed in advance over the phone, and once I was at my destination, I could devote all of my attention to being there instead of thinking about where I was heading next.
    I know that I missed events and get-togethers because I wasn’t on e-mail, text, or Facebook, but I didn’t feel left outbecause whatever I was doing, I was wholly immersed in it. I wasn’t distracted enough to care about what my other friends were up to that night. I was able to enjoy what I was doing rather than wondering whether the twenty other events or hangouts I knew were happening that night would have been more fun. And the best part was that I couldn’t see on social media all of the amazing things my friends were doing and how many of them were hanging out without me. Ignorance was bliss. The information overload was gone.
    My romantic relationship fared better too. We weren’t relying on incessant texting, e-mailing and Gchatting—where messages lack tone and often lead to confusion and conflict, or worse, lend themselves to unexpected minute-or hour-long lags in conversation that can send you down a rabbit hole of panic—so we had far fewer misunderstandings.
    I tend to “talk” a lot faster over text, which often means that much less thought and much more impulse seep into my responses and comments, and they don’t always