While AAA brings you a new battery if your old one dies and you’re stranded on the freeway but who brings you your smartphone when you’ve left it at home and you’re miles away, off to an important meeting or lunch date? Not Triple A. Not Verizon. Not T-Mobile.
While AAA brings you a new battery if your old one dies and you’re stranded on the freeway but who brings you your smartphone when you’ve left it at home and you’re miles away, off to an important meeting or lunch date? Not Triple A. Not Verizon. Not T-Mobile.
When I suddenly become aware my smartphone’s not with me—my instincts pop up with, “Oh heck! I’ll have to call Craig and ask him to swing by the house and get my Android and bring it to me.” He’s pretty good about things like that. So I reach for my phone to call hi. . . Oh, shoot!
They call them smartphones, but I’m not so sure. If they’re so smart, how come sometimes they forget to come with you when you leave? How come they let you leave them behind? You’d think they’d know better than to let you get out the door without them. They have all kinds of rings and dings and strange melodies they can play to get your attention. Some of them even talk. None of them remind you, “Don’t forget to take me!”
Discovering your phone didn’t come with you is downright catastrophic. How will you know who texted you? Was it important? Who called while you were miles away from your phone? Not to mention you’re going to get hours behind on the news, can’t check the traffic and won’t know what the weather will be this evening for your barbecue.
These smartphones are wonderful. I can’t imagine how we ever got along without them. They’ve become like our life’s blood. So I have an idea. Given my aversion to surgery of any sort, it isn’t one I’m eager to mention, but still. . . might be worth thinking about.
A little background: Implants are a natural part of life these days. All sorts of things are implanted into our bodies. Dental implants prevent you from getting caught at a five-star restaurant with no teeth for chewing. Other implants make us beautiful. Some restore functions that had failed us. iPods bring music to our ears. Oh! Sorry, not really an implant, is it? But how about a smartphone implant?
Wouldn’t that be great? You’d never forget your phone again. Not sure where you’d plant it—in your arm? leg? shoulder? It would have to be totally voice-controlled because how are you going to type on your arm? It would have to be where it can hear your talking to it and it would have to be where you could see it—for watching those YouTube videos and reading your e-mails. Your smartphone can read incoming texts to you, I think, but I’m not sure about the e-mails.
This is crazy. No one wants a smartphone implant. But hey, everyone was happy with their two tin cans and a string until Alexander Graham Bell came along. No one thought a string-less telephone was possible, but Bell proved them wrong and look how long that’s lasted.
Once when I forgot my Android phone I noticed a lot going on—things I’d missed since I got my first smartphone. The sky—a beautiful blue, a family at the next table laughing at the antics of their toddler, traffic on the freeway looking different than the last time I looked, with all those new cars and fancy headlights, taillights and shiny wheels. Today, my smartphone resting at home—again—I smiled at the white-haired gentleman coming out of Rite-Aid and saw him smile back at me.
Forget the implants. I’ll take my chances!
