i know it's silly,
but i felt bad
trading in my iphone 4
for an iphone 5 yesterday.
i got my iphone 4
february 23, 2011.
i know the date
because it was my niece's birthday
and i had returned a day early
from a long stay in florida to surprise her.
i had dropped and shattered
my blackberry in florida
and my new iphone
was waiting for me at home.
all this to say,
my phone and i
have been through a lot together
the past two years.
we've seen...
the redrocks of sedonna.
the beaches of florida.
the mountains of the west virgina.
the winding rivers of ohio.
the landscapes of places i love.
the faces of people i love.
we've weathered
sunshine.
storms.
snow.
life.
we've stayed connected
with conversations.
text messages.
skype calls.
facebook.
emails.
and instagram.
we've made new friends
and said goodbye to old ones.
it's my nature
to hold onto things.
i save emails.
text message,
voicemails,
notes.
and photos.
(even blurry ones
of things without
any real meaning.)
i'm a sentimental hoarder.
i have over 80,000 photos
on my imac.
i've only had it
for a little over two years.
i had to buy extra storage
for my gmail account.
i have boxes and boxes
of journals and notebooks.
i have recordings voicemails.
one of my favorites
is from when
david was three or four,
calling to tell me
about construction
on his grandma's street
so that i knew which way to go
when i picked him up after work...
mom, der's a weally big dump twuc.
you dust have to turn da udder way.
and another from my aunt,
left close to fifteen years ago,
letting me know
she made it home from the dentist.
amy, this is a message.
i'm home safe.
i'm okay.
she left it on my voicemail
at american greetings,
and when i left my staff position there,
i made a recording of it.
i've always treasured it,
even more so after she died
and listening to it
took on a new meaning
and brought a different
kind of comfort.
amy, this is a message.
i'm home safe.
i'm okay.
these past two years
have been the most transformational
of my life.
i lived the hell out of them.
so naturally,
there was a moment of panic
when i learned that my text messages
from the past two years
wouldn't transfer
to my new phone.
i held my phone in my hand
and considered keeping it.
like i said,
we had been through a lot together.
david, who was selling me
my new phone, said,
you can do screenshots
of your text messages.
i looked into his big brown,
frustrated eyes and said,
i have thousands of messages.
he shook his head.
i like reading my old text messages.
i like going back to the first messages
between jeff and i
and reliving falling in love
and seeing our relationship grow.
i like laughing at the funny emails
between my friends and i.
i like revisiting
the text messages my nieces
have sent me.
they use a lot of emoticons :)!
i like remembering.
but i also like a discount,
and i wanted the $80
i was getting for trading in my old phone.
so i handed it over
and i said a silent thank-you
to my iphone...
for all we had seen,
shared, and made it through.
saying it aloud
in front of david's coworkers
would have been
the last straw for him.
it's just a phone, right?
i keep things to remember,
but also out of fear
that i might lose
the moments i have deeply loved...
that i might forget.
but that's impossible.
in the words of helen keller,
{what we have once enjoyed
we can never lose.
all that we love
becomes a part of us.}
{fearless fridays}
posts inspired by the quote,
what would you attempt to do
if you knew you could not fail?
i would hit the delete button
more often :)
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