What to do when the Internet has forsaken you
This is a story about saying goodbye to the web involuntarily
The universe was spread out in front of me like a carpet of jewels. It was slightly inverted. The lake, calm at this point in the night, was a perfect sheet of glass under a sky flooded with twinklings.
Then the thought came: “I wish I could Instagram this.”
I should note: I’m horrible at Instagram. Not horrible in the sense that my shots make no sense, are unfocused, or contain no real virtue (if anyone’s Instagram snaps contain virtue), but in the sense that they are an exercise in Life Laundering. Like so many before me, I’m guilty of success-gramming, staging, giving that camera ready imitation of life that has helped vault the valuations of two giant technology companies.
I’m an asshole on Instagram, and Facebook, by association.
And I would have been, that starry night, if not for the the fact that my phone had failed. Dead. Persona non signal.
Without it, who would know how fantastic my vacation was? No one, save Amy, Turk, and I. And the horse flies, and fish, and the frogs and the loons. Someone would have to live to tell the tale.
It’s possible, actually more than likely, that Mars, Venus, and Mercury were all strutting before me in all their cosmic finery. It was a sight Neil degrasse Tyson would have approved of, on a dock in the far removed world of northern Maine. And I kept fidgeting for my phone.
Going without the services of the World Wide Web has become a kind of bohemian blessing, a knowing nod saying, “I get the Internet, I’m of the Internet, but I chose to go without. It’s more pure, the digital cleanse, man.”
I did not make that decision voluntarily.
When you find yourself in northern Maine in late August, far outside the reaches of Gmail accounts, obnoxious traffic, or any kind of verified social identity, you begin to contemplate the nature of technology. Especially when that technology has decided to abandon you. We were on vacation, with a stockpile of liquor, a mountain of books, and enough meat to make armies of vegetarians cry. And I was also without the Internet.
For five years we’ve been making this trip to Maine. It was too good a find to leave behind after we moved: A lakeside cabin 3 hours north of Portland on a lake near a small service town just past the University of Maine. It was removed, but not so much that you couldn’t find what you needed at the centrally located Walmart or my beloved “Steaks N’ Stuff” grocer.
Vacation is supposed to be the time when you leave everything you have behind you. Leave it at home, or on your desk back at the office. You pack the books, the shorts, Vanity Fair articles you’ve neglected for far too long. This is a time for removal from All The Things.
But we all know that’s not possible any more. Cell signals reach too far. WiFi has its tendrils everywhere. And right there, right inside our very pocket, is the temptations of Pandora, literal and figurative. The phone. You can cut me off from the iMac on my desk. You can sever my connection to the world on my MacBook. But my last resort, my closest friend, is still in my pocket. And it’s the worst offender.
Our phones have made it near impossible to ever really disconnect from the world, so all of us have found a way to dance around that disconnect. We try to ignore it at all costs. We hold ourselves back from touching the familiar ring tones and vibes in our pockets and purses. But it changes nothing. At some point or another you’re going to check the notifications. They’ll grow on you. And your vacation becomes null.
But why not? Even if you’re not checking Twitter or playing Dots, why not tell the world you’re poolside? Why not give them a teaser of the prime rib sitting on your plate and the Macallan riding shotgun in the glass nearby? If the world doesn’t know you’re having the best vacation, did it happen? Did it? Really?
That choice was taken away from me.
A year ago during the last respite from civilization I received a nastygram from my friends at AT&T: You need to stop using the data plan you purchased or we’re going to end you. The gist was this: You’ve strayed too far from our known map of towers, and as a result you’re exceeding the limits of your emergency supply of data. My choices, as described: We charge the shit out of you, cut you off, or send you to one of our competitors. Have a nice day.
Fast forward to this year. I’m lazy. Forgetful. Still on AT&T and driving up I-95, the portrait of the consummate Internet abuser. Eyes on the road, hands gripping the wheel, while surreptitiously drafting this year’s doomed fantasy football team. I had resigned myself to autodrafting, but Yahoo, in its increasingly sharp wisdom, updated its fantasy app, and lo and behold, I could draft Wes Welker from the comfort of my iPhone.
By the time we made camp, my phone had gone dark. Zero dark. My bars may have read full-strength, but the rest read “Off Network.” My pusher had cut me off. In fairness, it was not complete: I could receive texts and phone calls if need be. But my World Wide Web had just gotten a lot shorter.
As the starry night on the dock shows, it took some time for that fact to sink in. I found myself reaching for my phone at random intervals, feeling for a phantom alert, reflexively seeing what Twitter was up to, only to find a blank screen.
Meanwhile, in front of me, all the quiet wonder of a late summer day on a lake in Maine. A dock, perfect for taking in the sun, or setting out on a paddle boat for an afternoon exploration. A hammock, rocking between two fir trees just above the shoreline, shaded enough for snoozing and reading. The cabin; fully stocked. We don’t travel light for these vacations. All the makings for mojitos, margaritas, mai tais, mimosas, manhattans, negronis, old fashioneds, the list goes on. The gas grill, set for smoker duty most of the week, ribs, brisket, pulled pork, and just about anything else you can figure on cooking for 4 plus hours over a grill.
It sounds idyllic. And I sound like an idiot. Little boy lost without the Internet.
For some reason it felt unsafe to me at first. It reminded me of those stories when Peter Parker loses his powers, and instead of trying to live the normal life he says he wants he tries to become Spider-Man again.
It was worrying, how I reacted to being without the web. But slowly it began to pass. Interestingly enough, Amy’s iPhone, one generation newer than mine, did still have data. Faint and struggling as it was, the Internet could make its way into the forest. On more than one occasion she offered me Instagram privileges. After a while I decided it didn’t matter.
I did, however, take one final cheat: On an errand into town I stopped off in the parking lot of the old library to steal Wifi for a few minutes. A junkie, tying off his arm, looking for a vein in broad daylight as the blue hairs walk by to return their Carl Hiaasen books. But all I did was a brief check of email, set my out-of-office reply, and carry on.
If at anytime last week you told me I could get Wifi by rubbing two chipmunks together I would have been all about the critter Internet.
Things got easier. You’d have to be a monster to resist the pull of a vacation. The hammock was too inviting. I worked my way through the mound of books and graphic novels, and dug deeper into my collection of old bartender guides. (Did you know bourbon milk punch was a thing back in the day?) My phone was pressed into service as a dumb tool, a handy flashlight and food timer. That torpedo sound calling from my pocket? Time to replace the wood chips on the grill.
By our fourth day of vacation I had finally started to get around to writing. It’s something I’ve always told myself I wanted to do here. I’d be a fool not to. There’s a long table under a bay window looking out on the lake, the perfect writing spot. And each year I’d bring along the laptop, with the hopes of writing. It would then be put to use as a jukebox.
But this year was different. The stray ideas, the noodling, the random characters that migrated through my head, I started to put them to paper. Actual paper. I could say my loss of Internet made me reject technology outright, but that would be a lie. No, the thanks goes to Elmore Leonard. In so many of the remembrances of the late author they mentioned his work ethic, early and often, writing from the same space. Relentless. And on paper. So I copied him. On that errand into town I snagged a 17 cent notebook at Walmart. The words started to come out after that, some more formed than others. A notation in one margin says: “Read up on THIEVES & CHEFS.” Is there a novel in here, or a screenplay? I sure as hell hope so, but it’ll take more than a week’s remove in the Maine woods to make any of those come to life. But it could be worth it.
It’s the last day now. As I write this the rain is coming down, covering the cabin in the soft patter of drops and an early morning breeze. We’ll break down camp: Pack up, clean up, push off. It’ll probably be 6 hours before we get home. (Note: It was 6 and a half.) I’m praying traffic doesn’t hurt us, but it likely will. But by the time we reach any gridlock it’s likely my phone will have regained its powers.
Back among the land of the connected, finally able to catch up on all those all those IMDB searches. So many tweets to favorite. How many memes have I missed? Thinking of the triage that awaits in my inbox is enough to make me put down stakes here as a small town newspaper editor. But then I might have to contend with one of Stephen King’s giant invisible domes. (You thought that was just a book and TV show? Do you realize how rich the man is? He’s domed several small Maine towns already just for sport.)
It’s a fashionable thing now to renounce the Internet. We’re in a time when information just bombards us, and we’re stuck high on a hill with a cocktail umbrella as our only guard. The digital life is one where communication is our contract; the price you pay for the world’s information at your fingers is that it’s permanently attached to those fingers.
So some of us throw up our hands in frustration, and cry, “BEGONE YOU WICKED ELECTRICAL DEMON!”
This is the part where I’m supposed to sing the praises of unplugging, to give lessons on forsaking the web and turning from the ultra-connected life.
What bullshit. Pure, uncut bullshit.
If at anytime last week you told me I could get Wifi by rubbing two chipmunks together I would have been all about the critter Internet. Scouring the floor of the woods, just trying to get a signal so I could check a Twins score.
The Internet is fantastic. Our devices are amazing. Your life and mine are made better by them. They can prepare us for our day. They let us know what’s happening in the world (True fact: I have no idea what happened in the news between the dates of Aug. 26 — Sept. 1. It’s like a form of amnesia.). They can indeed make us safer. Anything you want to know, delivered to you almost before you finish your thought. “What planet is that, right above me, the one shining brighter than the rest?” My phone would have known. When I couldn’t recall the proportions for a biscuit recipe, the Internet, by way of Amy’s phone, delivered.
The simple fact is the one we already know: The Internet is wonderful, the Internet is terrible. Maybe it’s what the Internet does to us that is terrible. Just because we can be constantly tethered to our email doesn’t mean we should check it obsessively. If a tree falls in the forest and you can’t broadcast it on Facebook, did it really happen? And more importantly, does it matter? And furthermore, should I be worried that I’m pinned under this tree?
I can’t say definitively whether being without the services of the web contributed to me being able to do the kind of non-journalism writing I’ve been wanting to do for a while. Did I cut out more distractions in my life? Absolutely. Is it possible that once the brainspace I dedicated to being connected was freed up it opened the pathways to the more creative parts of my mind? Maybe. Sure, it’s my iPhone that has been plugging the dam of inspiration and artistic thought within me.
Or, it could also just be life. The demands of a job and the momentum of daily routine can be a hard thing to shake. And, not coincidentally, so can our over reliance and love affair with all the digital things. Maybe it’s not the web, or our devices alone that rob us, but our own addictive and human tendencies in conspiracy with them. It’s easier to blame technology than ourselves when we’re ignoring a blanket of stars for the glow of our phone.
I can’t, in good conscience recommend removing yourself from the Internet. I just can’t. It’s silly, even when it’s with the best intentions. I reserve the right to change my mind if I become stupid rich off a screenplay written during my exile from the web.
I can, however, recommend stopping to take a break.
