Mourning My Mornings
The year is 2025. I wake up in the middle of the night. Check my phone for the time. Open a couple apps. Doze off again.
I wake up for good now. Rub my eyes. Check my phone for the time. Again. Open a couple apps. Again. Scroll, double tap, tap the heart, save, send, forward, reply, comment, scroll again. Weekend or weekday, the scrolling, reruns, new drops, all wake and walk with me as I start my day. Sometimes it’s just Spotify, other days it’s my favorite show or podcast, others just the background noise of the timeline. But it’s always my phone. And I hate it. I despise the fact that all our lives revolve around our phones these days and I hate the fact that I need it to stay moving with the times.
I miss the feeling of waking up on a Saturday and not having my first move be to reach for my phone to see the time or an app. I miss cuddling my pillow with only my thoughts and feelings as they simmer into a comforting yet energetic mood to start the day. I love it when I can hear the birds wake up and sing. I miss being able to be in my own body for a while before interacting with the world. I miss settling into my self and creating the mental clarity I need to keep my goals in mind and mood aligned. Seeing the lifestyle change is devastating and confusing. It’s like watching a version of the old me dissolving as it clings to me, begging me to remember how good things could be and pleading for the opportunity to stay.
Makes me wonder, who decided “we needed everything in one place”? Who decided that minicomputers/tracking devices should live attached to us like leeches? Recording our every thought, interaction and preference.
Do they not know the joy of being incommunicado? Of having a simple morning creating the ambiance my soul desires. Why is it expected of me to log on every single moment of my life to “stay informed” and “connected”? Why do I have to post my opinions in order to be validated by people I most likely will never meet or share a meal with? These questions plague me.
Who decided this is the way forward for humanity when this lifestyle is depressing all of us who are connected in the matrix by default? Many decide to log off completely from social media and other apps for their mental health. So if this affects so many of us, why is it still the standard?
I want to… I will create routines that exalt my spirit and time here on this journey of Earth. I don’t want to be a slave to a never ending digital demand for content and engagement. Spotify is cool, but I miss the feeling of digging through my stacks of CDs and tapes and hearing the analog clatter, jewel-case chatter of physical copies. The ghost shuffle of an intuitive search that concludes when your mind and soul agree: “This one!”
I miss the feeling of not wanting to be entertained every second of my fuckin life.
How many hair or makeup tutorials, workout videos, parody sketches, trailers and promos do I actually need? How much randomness can my mind take before I actually go insane and lose my inner voice?
I feel like this may not be a popular sentiment, but I do want to do my best to unplug, particularly from the habit and routine of doomscrolling first thing in the morning. This is not what the beginning of the day should be like. My ideas and energy shouldn’t be drained into the ether first thing in the morning. I will be working on acquiring a nice alarm clock and working towards having more organic mornings, filled with books, yummy food, granny hobbies and the death of the narrative that tells us this is the only way towards the future.
