Dialing Back The Phone

 

Perhaps one of the most underrated songs by The Rolling Stones, in my humble opinion, comes off of their 1974 album It's Only Rock 'N' Roll, which saw the group in a transitional period, experimenting with new production methods and a sound somewhat more nuanced than the strictly blues-rock based material that they rode to stardom the decade prior. And it isn't the title track, which is largely what remains in the public consciousness of the album these days by anyone but a dedicated Stones enthusiast. It's actually the album's fifth track (the final cut on the A side, for vinyl hounds): Time Waits For No One. 

Time waits for no man, and it won't wait for me / Time waits for no one, and it won't wait for thee 

Drink in your summer, gather your corn / the dreams of the nighttime will vanish by dawn

Perhaps it's more cornball than those stale, sticky, spherical wads of glucose-coated popcorn that tend to get left on the kitchen counter after the trick or treat bag has been emptied and sorted, but the sentiment remains. Maybe it's just me noticing the once all-but-ignored clock of mortality we all walk around with, tick-tocking a little louder for me these days. It's wound differently for each of us, no one knowing exactly when their alarm is to go off, and having turned 40 recently, I find myself watching that second hand with nervous, wincing eyes. 

As a painfully self-aware individual, I've a tendency to sit on occasion and try to take a peek at myself from an outside perspective and assess what I see. Frankly, for a man whose life is likely a slice more than half over, I'm finding my behavior ridiculous and self-defeating. And, of course, what I'm talking about is my use of that limited commodity known as spare time. You may have surmised, based on the title of the post, that this time suck involves that 21st Century deity the cell phone.

It's true, I've fallen to the lure of the dopamine-dispensing data stream device. Prior to a few years ago, 10pm on any given evening would have found me in bed reading a book. Now I find myself in bed, propped against the headboard with a pillow wedged in the crook of my neck, scrolling through some dreck on Instagram or CNN or Youtube or Reddit that I find neither interesting nor informative.  But I just keep scrolling, index finger endlessly tracing upward in the same spot on the dumb little screen like I'm trying to itch a groove into it, or flick away a piece of lint that refuses to move. Mornings, in the before-times, I was prone to reading or doodling, or simply reviewing what it was I needed to accomplish that particular day while at the breakfast table. Now I find myself checking to see who, if anyone, has commented or "hearted" whatever painting or drawing I've posted somewhere, or to check the tracking updates on that set of spark plugs I bought online, for the 400th time. 

It's all rather stupid, really. The basic function for a telephone–cellular or otherwise–is to place and take phone calls. I know that definition has altered greatly over time, now that the noun "phone" is synonymous with "pocket computer", the way that Alanis Morissette managed to get the definition of the adjective "ironic" to be a synonym of the adjective "unfortunate" through a brain-cell killingly insipid pop song,  but the core function still remains. And the thing of it is, no one calls me. That's not a complaint, merely an observation. Once in a while I'll get a voicemail from some robo-marketer who claims to want to make an offer on my house, sight unseen, to add to their brokerage firm's investment portfolio, and on a rarer occasion I'll get a ring from one of my parents checking in, but truth be told...no one fucking calls me! And I don't call anyone either! Why do I have this thing? It does come in handy on occasion, when I need directions to a place I've never been before, but that's about it. 

I know it's the empowering tool of the everyman, cutting out the barriers of the entitled content makers, allowing each individual to be a broadcaster, actor, artist and journalist, which is why every second of everyone's life is filmed, every sandwich requires a photo shoot and anyone with an opinion is a journalist (note: I've never referred to myself as a journalist). Social media is all about self promotion, and when you've got nothing to sell or nothing the public wants to buy, you're just another fuzzy crackle in the sea of white noise, so you start staging shit. And then you're not living your life, you're tailoring your faux reality to match the brand version of you you're trying to sell for "views" or "likes" or cryptocurrency or whatever. So much chatter, so much self-obsession, so many people obsessed with other people's self-obsession. The value of analysis and information is below rock bottom these days, folks can't give it away; and apparently it's all subjective, unless you question or challenge it. Then it's defensible as subjective "truth". The trouble is, folks seem to be having a problem distinguishing between subjective and objective, truth and opinion these days. And it isn't endemic to any one age group or political stripe. Now, since there's a global network of fellow morons in their pockets to back them up, anyone can double down on their ignorance without ever having to reassess their behavior or viewpoints. Most of what passes for news on the aforementioned CNN, and other major news websites, isn't actual news, but op-ed pieces about hot button topics, distilled through the fervor of media outrage, and repurposed information on current click-baiting headlines reiterated endlessly into "new" stories, which are just subsequent repackaging of the same information to make people think they're reading something new, so they keep clicking. More page views means more advertiser income. 

And this is what I'm piddling away the limited remaining hours of my life on? So why am I reading it? To stoke my anxiety? 

It's irritating to sit and watch others around me as well; necks eternally bent, constantly detached from whatever is going on around them, faces glues to their phones. The realization that that's what I look like sends trickles of ice water into my veins and leaves me running for my Trazodone. A side-effect of this allegiance to these devices, subsequently, is the complaint about a lack of free time, as I've just myself complained about. The whole purpose of this long, whiny op-ed post, in fact! And the culprit is clear when you watch someone brushing their teeth for 20 minutes because they're not actually brushing their teeth. They have the brush in their mouth and one hand is gripping the handle, but their other hand is hoisting a cell phone mere inches from their eyeballs and they're more engaged with Twitter than toothpaste. And then comes the complaint about never being able to get to bed on time. How about watching someone pantomime spooning cereal to their face like a Romero zombie, while gazing stupidly at some dipshit's 11 second comedy video on TikTok on loop, followed by twenty others just like it,  and then bitching about how they never have enough time to get ready in the morning? Cut and paste these scenarios into walking the dog, cooking dinner, watching a movie, etcetera ad infinitum. Maybe the bleakest permutation of this is having been at a friend's house, watching people engage in feigned group activities while ogling their apples and androids. Imagine a birthday party where everyone in attendance barely acknowledges each other unless it's to pose them for pictures for their Facebook page.

But I can't change other people, and it's not my place to. To throw another cornball into the mix, I need to be the change I want to see. Essentially, I just need to put the damn thing away and reclaim what little time I have left on this burning planet by actually engaging in things that I enjoy doing, that make me a healthier and happier jaded old man blogger who occasionally posts pictures of paintings he's worked on. 

We'll see how long that resolution lasts.

Now get off of my digital lawn, I need to rake it. Hopefully, without a cell phone in my hand.