When I left for VA Beach, I didn’t realized that it wasn’t with me. I was just pleased to be taking a trip to get the scent of saltwater into my nostrals. It was about 30min into the drive when I realized it was missing. Yea, I had my mobile, and even my wireless keyboard. But, the iPad was missing. It felt empty for a moment, then I realized again what kind of mobile living that I have been bred in. I’ll miss the canvas, but I’ll have something similar and different in my pocket.
In my pocket. You see, mobiles can be classified as laptops, tablets, smartphones, feature phones, or even PDAs and MP3 players. It really is just about computing that fits your context, rather than you needing to be consumed within its domain. And yet, I’d been getting so used to the iPad as a canvas that I had forgotten that I used to treat my smartphone in the same way. It was wrong to do mobile this way, I’d been told. But, I bucked the statements and crafted another kind of living from what’s normal here. It became normal.
As the weekend continued, I realized that I started marking decisions about access to me that my smartphone had already been well-shaped into. It would fold into silence during meetings and sleeping hours. I no longer got email pushed to it, and so I had to consider whether it would be an email-free weekend or not (it was). It was even blog-free. But, no, not photo free. I have a 7yr old cousin that couldn’t take her heart away from me, nor I from her. Those were a few moments ment to be captured.
My heart nearly dropped when the mobile did. I normally don’t take the N97 on trips where there’s a chance that I’d be in a place where it would be dropped or injured. But, it fell. It was positioned where it usually is in front of my car radio. Norfolk really needs to address those railroad tracks. The bump knocked my mobile off it post, and it landed on the area where the charger was connected. Immediately, it stopped charging. I gulped a bit.
I tried both the mobile and my headset, but neither would charge. It seemed that it might only be the charger, but then it wouldn’t charge when in a wall wart. Uh oh. I was accessible – but only until my two batteries decided to call it quits (the older battery gives me about 6hrs max, its old). But, some bending and perseverance with the wall wart after losing an hour of sleep and getting a totally dead battery got me up. My pocket had some life again.
The QR code needs to be redone on the rear. But, that group wasn’t ready for that kind of mobile push. The conversation moved towards mobile, but not that far. I felt that pang of not having my card on me, but I could rap off an email or SMS easier than just doing a card – too bad others don’t do SMS for contact swapping (yet…)
I’m remembering how versatile I used to be. I remember how with a mobile that it wasn’t just about applications, but context about what worked and where. You had to adjust to power needs, especially if you do something silly like running a web server on your mobile. But man, its the light in your pocket. Nothing short of a bible in your pocket gets that much handspace 🙂
Its fun. Its Monday and I’m still rolling. And like before the iPad, I’m getting work done here and there and really not missing a beat. But then it will go back into my pocket and I’ll become open to engaging the world around me. Yea, I don’t have that canvas to read and create like with the iPad, but I do have a means to engage as I need. That’s something that I missed… I’ve got to make a better effort not to lose that kind of mobility and living.
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