ring ring ring, banana phooone

When I was 12, my then best friend Ashley and I watched Clueless about 847x.

A week.

We were obsessed with Di and Cher, and every chance we got we snuck out of the house in the forbidden knee high stockings and short plaid skirts and heeled platform shoes of the Glorious Late 90's, and held fake cell phones the size of our heads and pretended to talk through them.

Ah, the 90's

When I was 15, my parents got cell phones. And because Family Plans were just coming out, Josh and Mary each got a phone. And after a few months, I sorta kinda borrowed my mom's phone and never gave it back. And thus, I got a phone. It was the size and width of a modern day TV remote, had an 8" long antena and came with 5 different ring tones! It was like, $5 a minute to make any calls, so I never turned it on. Just carrying it around made me feel like the coolest person ever. 

It turned out to be a god-send the next year when I got my license, because I got lost every time I left the base. And instead of learning how to read a map, I learned how to take directions from my Dad while driving and using the phone. Important moments in life, guys.

When I was 18, I got my first "cool" flip phone. It was silver and shiny and palm sized and had 10 different ring tones! and an animated background screen--big pimpin. That fall, I left for college, where I took hours long walks around campus calling everyone I knew to escape my pregnant roommates (true story) and stave off homesickness. I went over my minutes and ran up my bill every month. And later that year, I discovered text messaging--even though I didn't have a texting plan. 

My mom almost drove up to New York to take my phone away from me when she got a $50 bill--just for texts--until the Verizon rep reminded her that I actually saved money by texting, because for once, I didn't go over my minutes. So she got me a texting plan. (have I mentioned how awesome my parents were for supporting my cellular habits? thanks, mom & dad!)

Since the spring of freshman year, I've had a weird, co-dependent relationship with my phone. While my friends and family can attest that I can't answer 90% of the time, and the time it takes for me to return a call gets longer the older I get, I still need to have a functioning phone. Like, need. Yes, I can be separated from it for long periods of time and I'll be ok, even relieved to be without it, but once we are reunited it's like nothing's changed. It's gross how addicted I am to it. You know those articles that are written about people becoming more isolated the more "connected" they become through their phones? yeah, those articles are written about me. 

So when my chipper buddy at Best Buy (we're buddies now, because I've been in there approximately 47x since May to replace my shattered and problematic phone, so we're on first name basis) told me nothing in my insurance covers "lost or stolen phones," my only options were to buy a new phone at full retail (YIKES), or wait until January for an upgrade, I almost cried. And when he saw the First World Anguish wash over my face, his manager suggested I re-activate one of my old phones, should I still have them.

Being a sentimental hoarder, of course I still have them. I could never bring myself to throw out my old phones. They hang around in my memory box until their batteries finally die out, then I recycle them. But until they die, turning them on is like opening a time capsule. So I busted out my old Droid, the first of its kind, and re-activated it.

Man, it's like down grading from a Mac Book Pro to Windows 95. Even though it's only 2 years old, it already feels, sounds, looks, and moves like a dinosaur. It's been live for 1 day and I already want to hit it with a hammer. And while I appreciate the nostalgia from all the old text threads and pictures I didn't wipe from the phone, and all the old familiar tones and games, etc., I miss being able to take psuedo-quality pictures and make phone calls with clarity and receive emails. 

Looks like I'll be breaking my phone addiction this year.

also, completely unrelated: It's been 15 years, and I'd still buy this entire outfit if I saw it on a store mannequin (except for the backpack purse. I hate those):

I miss you, 90's