Three days, you say?

Seven days seemed too ambitious. 

One day wasn’t long enough.

Three days…three days? I think I could do that. 

I knew by now it wasn’t just social media I was addicted to, it was the entirety of the miniature computer that fit snugly in my pocket. Even without scrolling Instagram for hours, I found other ways to score my little dopamine hits while keeping my eyes locked on the screen. The longest I had thrown the smartphone into the K-Safe had been fifteen hours, but I had lofty goals ahead of me. 

I spun the dial and watched the hours increase. Twenty-four hours turned into one day, forty-eight morphed into two, until it settled on exactly three days. Spinning the dial and pressing the giant white button had become part of the fun, a ritual that signaled the beginning of the smartphone cleanse. 

The K-Safe locked and I tapped on the plastic, as though saying goodbye to an animal in the zoo. The smartphone, turned off, lay on its side, propped up by the awkward angle it had taken on when I threw it into the box.

I placed the safe on a shelf on the island in the kitchen. I didn’t need it on constant display, but it seemed appropriate to keep the Kitchen Safe in the room responsible for its namesake. It was Monday afternoon, and I’d return to open it on Thursday. 

The first night was business as usual. It hadn’t taken long to get used to only having the phone out for a couple of hours a day. Evenings now consisted of the annual watching of Gilmore Girls, followed by reading before bed. If I felt restless while trying to fall asleep, I could no longer cocoon under the covers with all the information in the world inches from my face, which meant either falling asleep sooner or learning to be patient with the process.

Tuesday morning brought a change in routine. While I would normally check messages on Instagram and Whatsapp before work, I instead stood in the kitchen, feet away from the locked up smartphone, and watched the light pour in through the window as the Keurig brewed enough caffeine to make me human.

I want to say I was pining to check my messages, but with the option taken away from me, it was far from my mind. It was as though the part of my brain that was addicted to the constant hits of dopamine knew the source wasn’t available and had therefore decided to quiet down. 

Wednesday brought a bit of a hiccup. I am normally very on top of my appointments, keeping a mental note of exactly when I have to leave the house. Somehow, perhaps in the busyness of month end, I ended up being an entire hour early to an appointment. I only realized it once I pulled into the parking lot. 

I looked around. There was a coffee shop nearby and not much else. I only had my flip phone - no book or smartphone. Even if I did have my smartphone, it wasn’t hooked up to data, but I could have found wifi in the coffee shop and entertained myself that way.

So, here I was with an hour to spare. With where I was in the city there wasn’t enough time to leave and return, so I turned my car off and looked up at the bright blue sky. I messaged a few friends (with great difficulty, due to the flip phone), to have a laugh about my predicament. Months ago I would have been able to sit there and mindlessly scroll, but now, with that option taken away, I only had the moment. 

I looked at my car. It desperately needed to be cleaned. Were the seats always that colour? How was I supposed to get all this dog hair out of the carpets? When did I go over 100,000 kilometers? I probably need to have some sort of maintenance done. I wish I could jazz it up a bit in here.

A car pulled into the spot beside me. There was a gym on the first floor of the building my appointment was in, and the man’s attire led me to guess that was his destination. Curiously, he remained in the car for a while. I wondered if he was also an hour early for his appointment. He, however, did have a smartphone, and between scrolling and nodding his head to the bass that he decided an entire city block should be subjected to, he seemed more than entertained while he waited to go in. 

I sighed.

Then I smiled.

This was boredom. 

I had, of course, experienced boredom before. Usually the second the feeling arose, I would whip out the smartphone. I wonder how many things around me I hadn’t noticed. Now, sitting in this car, the world was in front of me. It wasn’t a particularly exciting world on a Wednesday afternoon at 2:15 p.m., but it was a world that I was happy to be noticing. I’ve been addicted to my smartphone for the better part of fifteen years, and I can’t imagine how much I’ve let pass me by while staring at the glow of a four inch screen. 

Returning home, I happened to be in the kitchen when I heard the buzzing of the K-Safe unlocking. I grabbed the smartphone, plugged it in, and held the side button down until the familiar Google logo appeared. After checking messages and replying to a few funny memes, I scrolled Instagram for a few minutes. I quickly felt myself sliding back into the social media daze. Making a quick decision, I turned the phone off, threw it back in the safe, and set it for another twenty-four hours, when I’ll have a scheduled Whatsapp call with a friend.

I still have an alarming lack of willpower, but I seem to have just enough to hold myself back as I watch the K-Safe count down before it seals shut for whatever time I’ve determined. Those five seconds of willpower is a gift to myself for the rest of the day.