Feeling nostalgic for more comfortable technology
I’m going to tell you a secret. I have an “old” cellphone. Alright, that’s not really a secret. I actually get asked a lot when I’m getting a new one.
If I had my way, I never would.
My phone is an iPhone SE, which is kind of like a 5, I’m told. It was a major upgrade a few years ago from my much beloved QWERTY-keyboard phone that I swore I would keep forever. The QWERTY was a major upgrade from my first phone, an incredibly basic flip phone that was virtually impossible to use for sending text messages.
Do you remember having to hit each key three or four times to select the correct letter?
Yeah, that kind.
I loved the QWERTY keyboard phone. But, alas, old QWERTY began to glitch and shut down in the midst of even the most basic functions – and a friend asked me how I got the museum to loan me an exhibit – so a replacement eventually became necessity.
When I went looking for suitable replacement models, it seemed this iPhone was about the basest of the base models then available, so I bought it.
But it took me weeks, if not months, to be able to navigate its screens. To become fluid with its functions and its nuances. To stop being afraid of its disintegration every time I set it down normally. To be remotely glad I made the purchase.
And now here I am, maybe four years later, wondering how much longer this SE iPhone will hold out. This phone now has a few minor glitches and a fairly serious memory problem. Certain apps shut off in the middle of use, It doesn’t always connect to my car’s Bluetooth – and sometimes disconnects once it has connected – and tells me frequently it is out of available memory.
I have deleted all infrequently used apps, I send my pictures to my laptop monthly and I delete conversations from my text messages if memes, GIFs, videos and pictures are contained within. And to be honest, I don’t even know if any of that is helping. What I do know is I’m not sure I’ll survive the inevitable upgrade that will likely be required sooner than later.
Still, I am beginning to think a lot of the stuff a smartphone can do isn’t so important. I’m beginning to believe my husband’s philosophy of “green button means call; red button means hang up” is all that matters in a cellphone. He had his own brief dalliance with smartphones before returning to a basic flip phone. It ended when the phone fell off the tractor and into the hay bine.
We managed to find him a new flip phone in the Verizon store and he’s been much happier since. I wonder if I could be lucky enough to find a brand new phone like the phone I have now?
Or perhaps better yet, a brand new QWERTY-type phone?
I don’t know that I could return all the way back to a flip phone with as many texts as I send, but a good, old-fashioned QWERTY might be just the thing. We’ll just have to see when the time comes. I still plan to limp this one along until there’s nothing else to do.
And then maybe I’ll check with the museum.