(originally written on December 25, 2021)
The first day of owning a dumb phone was not full of anxiety from digital detox.
On the morning of December 24, I picked up the secondhand Nokia 3310 that I purchased online. Being late for work, I didn’t swap my SIM to the phone (it requires an adapter anyways), so I shove it into my pocket.
Size is a great advantage of dumb phone, I didn’t have to pull out the phone every time I sit. Even during walking, the size of the phone doesn’t break the posture. Smartphone inside the front or back pocket never felt right, it’s always awkward to walk with that.
I realize my first day reaction is not anxiety. I had, in my mind, to show my colleague the photo quality of the 2 megapixel camera, but I didn’t. I kept it inside my pocket the whole time. Something stopped me from doing that, and I think it was embarrassment. After all, it takes an effort to go against the norm.
What I couldn’t figure out at this point is the source of this feeling. Nevertheless, here are two hypothesis I have. First is the trust of this decision, I don’t have full confidence in this adjustment, which brings me back to my college days. It made sense, it’s only the first day and I haven’t dive into yet. The second guess has to do with how I perceive myself. As someone who works in the IT industry and as a marketing role, I should be on the edge of technologies, but this dumb phone is exactly the opposite to that. What part of myself will change, now or later, if the tech savvy part of me is taken away?
Fortunately or unfortunately, this experiment didn’t last long. That night I found out the phone only support 2G network, which service is terminated in Taiwan. I will need to purchase another phone to continue this experiment.