What a stranger at a bus stop told me about my phone habits

I was waiting for the 4 bus in Portland last Tuesday and this older guy named Hank just started talking to me. He said I looked at my phone 8 times in 10 minutes and asked if I was expecting an emergency. I put my phone away and we ended up talking about his garden for 20 minutes. Has anyone else had a random person call them out on something small like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

kelly.dylan16d ago

Ngl, you're kind of lucky it was a chill older guy like Hank and not someone who'd get weird about it. I had a lady at a coffee shop once count how many times I unlocked my phone while waiting for my drink and she was way too smug about it, like she'd caught me doing something wrong. Honestly, I think people who do this usually have good intentions but they forget that not everyone's phone habit means they're addicted. Sometimes you're just checking the time or looking at a map or reading a recipe. Still, I get what Hank was going for with the garden thing though. It's like he was trying to show you that real life is better than scrolling, which is fair even if the delivery was a little awkward.

nancy82416d ago

lol the lady counting unlocks is wild, thats a whole new level. But heres something nobody really talks about, @kelly.dylan - maybe those phone interventions are more about the person doing them than the person on the phone. Like, Hank mightve been bored with his own life and saw you as a chance to feel like a wise old mentor for a minute. That lady at the coffee shop probably felt invisible and needed to feel superior for a second. Not saying its okay, just that people project their own stuff onto your screen time. Sometimes your quick scroll is literally just checking if the bread is done baking or looking up a dog breed you saw, not some deep existential crisis.