Once in awhile I like to imagine what my life would be like without my "smartphone" and because of the creepy crawly feeling I get I hold my phone close and hope that it never goes away. It has become an extension of my hand - not so much my face anymore because I rarely "talk" on it. My phone has really become more a part of me than... well actual parts of me. If I need some quick inspiration I open the 3G browser and surf to my hearts content, I can carry on multiple text and instant message conversations, and if I get that terrible "I forgot to pay a bill" feeling I can check all of my accounts with the touch of the screen.

It has made my life so easy that the thought of having a phone with a cord just confounds me - even if I had a corded phone I couldn't do anything with it (without my mobile) because I don't know anyones number. I do have memories of when I was very little and you couldn't even tell who was callling you - it was like a big surprise everytime ("Hello? ... Who is this? Oh...")! It all seems like it was so long ago and for me the phone is advancing so fast, first was call waiting where you could have more than one person on the line at a time (hot dog!), and then caller ID, and then you could block your caller ID if you were stalking someone and didn't want them to know it was you, and then they could get a tracer and call you back by pushing numbers, and then caller ID blocking so anyone who blocks their number  (bill collectors) couldn't ge through, and then it all became mobile, and then texting took off, and then all of the phones got so smart you could use them like 24 hour computers and never be away from the world (or porn) - even for a second!

Its scary, right? All of this has happened in like the last 10 years - you don't even need to stop for directions anymore because the GPS on your phone is generally a lot better at giving them than the elderly man at the corner store, but I digress. I often wonder what the phones will be capable of in the future. It's so Jetson-y to me and even so I could not imagine life without the constant connection but I have a fear this constant connection is what makes us so vulnerable. We can be pinpointed on most any phone (not just the "smart" ones) at any given time. "Hello.. oh Hi BIG BROTHER.. welcome to my private personal life" - might be a phrase that we will want to keep in mind for the foreseeable future. The large companies who supply us with our phones can keep records of our calls, texts, emails, browser history (yes, even your desperate Craigslist Missed Connection post)... everything - for LIFE, and to my knowledge there is no limit on when it may be destroyed or what the effect this information will have in the legal realm.

While I'm thinking about it all - how silly is the "talk to text" someone? Why not just call them if you get to that point?

Anyway, we are all so overloaded with information and technology and the future of phones might make us all even more connected - the phones might even come alive and use us to communicate amongst themselves. It could happen! I have been reading about how our technology is starting to "dumb us down" - in the scary FOX "News" kind of way! If we all get so "slow" over the years why even bother being connected? I guess the manufactured feeling that without that connection, life would be miserable, is reason enough for us to all keep going down this path - but i cld b wrng.