i.PhoneY

A tartan blanket on my lap and a warm cup of tea in hand, I look out of my window. “How the world has changed?” I hear myself say to an empty room. I light a cigarette, disgusted by the new packaging of cancerous lungs and flaccid cigarettes mocking as penises. Indeed, the world has changed. I can see two guys, on both opposite sides of my street, doing the iPhone dance: they glimpse briefly at each other while writing vigorously with their thumbs. There is no direct contact, no touching…not yet.   

 I remember a time when dating was organic: when you would bump into a cute guy, make a passing remark about Madonna and wait, feverishly, for him to get the hint. When he did: it was Christmas and New Year’s rolled into one. You would smile; he would stroke your arm - It was in the bag! You would agree on a place and a time to meet and, showing up an hour early, you would walk up and down the street, checking your hair in shop windows. If he didn’t come, you returned home, struggling to get closure: Why didn’t he come? Was it my hair? That’s how we rolled in the nineties: Naïve and deluded. Ah! The nineties…

But a diabolical device was to become mainstream: the mobile phone, forever killing romanticism and serendipity. Now, if the guy didn’t show up, you would call him up and check up on him. He would make up some lame excuse about his aunt being in a fatal car accident and you would know he was a knob-head and not give him a second thought…Unless? Unless he was really cute. Stalking had just started. And as mobile phones became smart, stalking became a sport. 

It started innocently enough. You sent him a text. A well-meant text about how handsome you thought he was and about how really looking forward to going on your date you were. He never replied. You waited patiently, phone in hand, while running your errands, but he never wrote back. You texted him repeatedly, you called one too many times. He never picked up. He changed his number. You gave up.

Then the iPhone came into being, previous rules did not apply. No need to casually bump into someone and let fate runs its course. every single man available is now an app away: Grindr, offering you pictures, stats, fetishes and geographical location in feet! From the blond gym bunny, looking for no strings-attached fun, a mere five feet away; to the bear, who just left work, at the end of the street; and your Spanish teacher, whom you just saw jogging past you. Everywhere you go, whether it is grocery shopping or putting out your recycling bins, you can check the status of the aroused male population crossing your path. They’re everywhere and willing and by sliding your finger, they’re yours.   

With a tartan blanket on my lap and a warm cup of tea in hand, I look out of my window. A tear slowly made its way down my cheek: I don’t have an iPhone.