DBA

At times I try to disconnect from having my phone in hand so I can avoid the multiple distractions that it offers. Sometimes though, I like to make sure my phone is charged and available, one of those times is when I go out for a ride on my motorbike.

You see, I use the phone as a GPS, a speed camera reminder (ahem!) and it also means I can check in with my wife when I’m on the way home. The rides generally don’t have a fixed return time so I like to send a message that says, without saying, I’m fine, I’m alive and I’ll be home in an hour.

Yesterday I went out for the first ride in a month, leaving our new home and heading up into the hills and over to Skipton. About 15 minutes in to the ride the battery on my phone suddenly died and for a brief moment my anxiety levels hit the panic limiter. Which road do I take? Which exit on the roundabout? What if I get lost? What if I can’t tell my wife (without telling her) that I’m not dead.

I was suffering with ‘Dead Battery Anxiety’ or DBA as it is known in the medical profession*

Then I remembered the purpose of my ride which was to enjoy myself doing something I live in an area of extreme beauty. I didn’t have a deadline to meet and it didn’t have to be Skipton that I ended up in as that was a random choice anyway. It didn’t matter if I took the first exit on the roundabout when the road to Skipton was via the second exit. It didn’t matter that there was no voice in my helmet speakers saying ‘in one mile stay in the left lane’.

My phone was dead and it didn’t matter!

When I was 17/18 I used to ride my motorbike from my home in Yorkshire to Skipton to a lovely little café that did a delicious afternoon tea. I would take different routes to get there but I never took a map and this was the beginning of the 1980’s so I didn’t have Waze either. My ride yesterday took me back to that time, a simpler time maybe but that might just be the view through those glasses I wear from time to time. There’s nothing wrong with a little rose-tint. We all do it, right!

So let me suggest you actively plan a trip, be it by bus, car, train, cycle or on foot with the intent that you will switch your phone off for the entire time and do things ‘old school’. If you get lost, stop and ask someone. Make sure you have a means of paying for something so you don’t have to switch your phone on to use Apple Pay (and oh look, there’s a post from Laura, I’ll just take a quick look). If you already do this then I applaud you.

Disconnect!

*I made that up.