I got a new phone today. I didn't really want to, but my old Nokia N95 stopped having any sound a while ago (I could only talk to people through loud speaker), and today I realised people couldn't actually hear me through it, either.
I'll be honest, even as I play with my shiny new HTC Wildfire, with its fancy retro camera functions and instant Facebook messaging, I'm pretty heartbroken to say goodbye to my N95. Which is why it's been placed carefully next to me on the shelf and not into the bin. That phone's been with me for years, has been to so many foreign countries with me, has taken years worth of photos. Its text message tone (David Tennant and John Barrowman exclaiming their love of cakes together, from some Doctor Who Confidential years ago) has become iconic* to those who know me. This phone just is me, in the way that my beautiful Suzuki Vitara was me, and my old pink fat DS. And now none of those things are me anymore, because they're all broken through constant use and attention. Apart from the jeep, that is, which is just plain broken.
I'm a horribly sentimental old cow, really. My fat pink DS was so beaten up, its top screen was attached only by the wiring that linked it all together. It was pretty clever, really; the top screen could rotate and pivot like a modern laptop or something. I could show people across from me the top screen of the game I was playing. I refused to give it up. I held it together with tape and diligently continued playing, until mum decided that enough was enough, and treated me for my birthday to a DSi XL, because I not-so-silently loathe the proportions of the tiny DS lite.
My old fat DS, like my N95, is tucked away safely, pride of place on a shelf beside me. It's stupid, I suppose, to become sentimental over technology, but these things were loyal to me and served me well. That DS is the machine I played the Ace Attorney games on, which in a subtle, boring and entirely undramatic way, changed my life. It doesn't belong in the bin, any more than a valued necklace, photograph or journal does. Who cares that technology is meant to be fast paced and ever evolving? It's not the machines or how fancy they are, but what they do for you, that matters.
So now I'm the owner of a real Smart Phone. Welcome to the modern world, Selena. Time to carve some new memories into it.
* I think some people absolutely loathe it, truth be told.
Picture entirely unrelated, save for having been taken with some old vignette mode on my Wildfire.
