Whilst without my laptop, I experienced a weird range of emotions in differing stages, stages that I have since discovered are quite common amongst computer addicts when, like me, their computer also breaks down. Below I have outlined these stages and believe it vital to have done so in order to educate others for the greater good of mankind.

Remember, knowledge is power, my friends…

Fear

This stage came within a few short seconds of realising that I no longer had the use of my MacBook and is a very scary stage which initially involves one having an immense feeling of fear that they will be unable to cope… or go on. This stage does not necessarily bring about the immediate realization that one is an addict as one is genuinely too busy fretting about how life can continue without the use of a computer and internet access.

Of course, this is absurd. But this initial stage of anxiety that computer addicts have (as they increasingly perspire whilst hastily stabbing multiple keys on their keyboard in the vain hope of getting their computer to work again) is akin to all types of junkies and is no laughing matter at all… as funny as it may appear to others – that are far less reliant on their computers – to witness.

The sweaty palms. The heart palpitations. The sick feeling welling up in the pit of your stomach at the realisation that you forgot to back up…

Seriously, it’s not funny.

Withdrawal

After all attempts to continue without my laptop had failed, I attempted to, at first, continue on via my phone but such a tiny screen makes it virtually impossible to carry on with any major work. I then tried to get my eldest to share their iPad with me, but the battles that ensued (from me attempting to let it be known that my work is far more important than any of the teenage current trends or popular YouTube videos, only to be rebuffed time and time again) just left me drained. It was around this point that I remembered that my eldest also possessed a PC that was not even a year old but, through lack of use, I had recently stored in the attic. Exhilarated that I would soon be back in front of a computer, I retrieved it only for that feeling of despair to return upon realising that, having not owned a Windows for over ten years, I was unable to figure out how to do the most simplest of functions on it.

This is the withdrawal stage. When that initial glimmer of hope has been dashed, and you suddenly feel abandoned in a wilderness of complete and utter loss because… you use your computer for everything!

It was at this stage that, a few days later, I tried purchasing a few items for the home from an Ikea catalogue and was disgusted by the fact that, without my MacBook, I was unable to do so! Despite fully believing that literature being readily available on e-readers to be an utter abomination (no gadget can replace the feeling and smell of a book, especially a classic novel when read in bed), I found what was once so easy – in going through a catalogue – had now become inexplicably complicated.

From previously having the ease of just having to type anything into Google, the whole rigmarole now involved having to go to the index page at the back, to then have to find the relevant pages, only to then have to physically scan through the numerous different items on the numerous different pages… After a few minutes, I gave up and threw the catalogue in the bin.

Dawn

This is when it hits home. When there is no escaping the fact that one is a complete and utter computer addict. This is also the point that will determine how you choose to go on. Do you accept that you have a problem or do you continue in denial, having convinced yourself that the only problem you have is having no computer… ?

If you choose the former, you are well and truly ready for the final stage:

Enlightenment

It is at this stage that after admittance, initial disgust (that even if you don’t spend literally twenty three hours a day playing World of War craft – or whatever it is that is in vogue in the world of computer geeks – the way you were going, you might has well have been… ) and shame, comes the determination to do something about it.

I retrieved my copy of Thomas Hardy’s ‘Return of the Native’ that I have had for decades and read for the first time within a matter of days, at once remembering with pure nostalgia, how much I loved books.

With this new found hunger to be filled with a life beyond the computer, I took to doing other things I had long since forgotten or stopped doing: going for walks in the beautiful morning on a wonderful clear day. Painting. Playing parlour games after dinner with the children… okay, that last one never happened (and besides, if I had even attempted to do that, my eldest would have just taken one look up at me from their iPad, before rolling their eyes and telling me I was being ridiculous and that there was no way in the world that I would get them to “do anything so gay”… ), but you get my point.

This is the time when not only does one hunger to become reacquainted with the things they once loved but have long since neglected, but also a time to discover knew things to enjoy.

Whilst waiting for the computer to be fixed or replaced.

It is also an opportunity to think of simpler times and realise that the very gadgets that many feel they can do with out, did not exist a short while ago.

How many parents often get upset with their children for forgetting to fully charge their mobile phone before they go out or for leaving said phone at home, only to recall that they themselves never possessed one and yet have lived to tell the tale… ?

How many people, if without their telephone, would be able to recall even one family members phone number off by heart… ?

How many people are so reliant on their navigators when driving that they would be unable to go on a journey (that they had probably taken before) without it… ?

There is no denying the advancement in technology over the past few years has been phenomenal, but at what cost? Especially If, in essence, so many feel that they would be unable to cope if they were forced to go without what did not exist (at least, not in it’s present form) some ten or twenty years ago?

How can man become so reliant on, and get so stressed out by, that which is man-made… ?

I’m not saying that an overload of technology has deprived many of their basic survival skills or an appreciation of nature, but…

With car navigators, when was the last time anybody, if ever, read a map? The fact that one no longer has to, in my view, is not a good thing.

If left in the wilderness how long could many survive without any basic knowledge of survival skills, without a ‘sat nav’ or – being surrounded by only rocks and dust – without a place to plug in their iPhone, iPad or Mac in order to be able to Google “How does one survive in the wilderness?”

(Blame it on the Apple… )

I guess what I’m getting at is that of course advancement shouldn’t cease. Mankind must improve in order to evolve. However, mankind should be wary of basing their advancement on technology and take the time to recall how beautiful they are and the world around them is. And always has been.

A picture of the sunset or the sky at night on one’s screen saver will always pale into significance in comparison to the real thing.

So, switch off the computer for a day or two and take the time to appreciate being human again.

Look up at the sky.

Read a REAL book.

In the park.

Go for a long walk.

With a map.

(But remember to charge your mobile phone fully and take it with you… just in case you get lost!)

Stay beautiful.

xxx