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No Service
No cell phone service unhinges Jaya Padmanabhan's summer vacation in Big Sur.
By Jaya Padmanabahn
We arrived at our cabin among the tall redwoods in Big Sur National Park, and I noticed that the little service icon at the top left-hand corner of my iPhone was spinning and searching. Finally, the phone displayed its preprogrammed, resigned message, "No Service." We were 90 miles from home, surrounded by chaparral-covered hillsides with no mode of electronic communication. No phones, emails or texts.
Within a few minutes of frantic searching, we found a small pocket of service in the east corner of our room if we stood on a chair and stretched out our hand. Those first few hours we jockeyed for that chair.
Various emergency scenarios flew through my mind. What if my mother had a fall? What if my dog choked on a bone? What if my house got burglarized?
Much like withdrawal from some psychoactive influence, I spent most of the first evening of that weekend thinking of the streams of information on my now silent gadget that I was being denied. I had built a case of immense personal significance, and I was now suffering from its lack of validity. I was indispensable. Therefore, I was dependent.
The next morning I suffered a twinge of peevishness at not being able to download the Saturday editorials, but by mid-afternoon my short-term memory bank was filling with versions of verdant foliage. With the discovery of a path that led to a burbling rill, my withdrawal was complete.
That weekend, I discovered how to step down from the treadmill of connectivity. I became an effective communicator. I read. I hiked. I paused to admire vistas of craggy outcrops. I inched close enough to feel the spray of a waterfall. My friend and I dissected elements of our lives. All without being compelled to furtively glance at a touch screen.
It was a short-term liberation, for I'm back where I was, imprisoned by my gadgets. But I often imagine returning to that no-service area with a renewed sense of humility.
With a Perspective, I'm Jaya Padmanabahn.
Jaya Padmanabhan is editor of India Currents magazine.
