Unplugging revisited

I read a quote on Andrew Sullivan’s blog written by Michael Brendan Dougherty. It rang true for me in a way that I have noticed only recently. Lately when traveling I have left the computer behind, thinking I don’t need it for just a few days, effectively unplugging from the whole thing. Often my cell phone doesn’t work in these places either, so I have to wait for access or more bars to talk with my kids, with my friends. This in effect is distancing me from some people, it seems, since I haven’t been writing as many emails, not calling as often, somehow unplugging from all the electronic substitutes for everyday relationships. I couldn’t manage my life right now without electronics, however, I am too far from everyone important to me. Still, I notice the difference. What Mr Dougherty said was this: DING!!!’

“Immediately, I realized how much anxiety the flow and ease of communication brings. The annoyance people have when they cannot reach you. The itch to pick up the silent cell phone and check to see if anyone has called or texted. The certain knowledge that e-mail is quite figuratively piling up in your endlessly expansive gmail account. After you put away the devices that keep you connected to the flow, put them out of your sight, the anxiety begins to recede, slowly. The obligation to respond to e-mails almost instantly, or at least within a few hours, disappears, and you can imagine yourself having normal conversation, relaxed, the way your grandparents did. The effect of unplugging is the same as living in a foreign country for a period of time, you can read about the events taking place after the fact, but you don’t experience them in real time, and the panic recedes.”