Annoyed

I lost my cell phone on Saturday. Upsetting for a few reasons. Number one, I don’t lose things anymore. I really don’t. I misplace them, meaning I recognize they’re missing, I don’t worry about it because I know they’ll turn up, and then they do. I made a very conscious decision back in 2005 to be more organized about my stuff, and it’s pretty much worked. I don’t remember the last thing I lost. I ALWAYS find it.

But this was different. When I realized it was missing, there was no sense of Oh, it must be back at the house. Instead there was a creeping dread of it’s gone, SUCKA! I tried to put it out of my head and go on about my evening activity, which was attending an acquaintances’ play, but I couldn’t shake the creeping dread, and I ended up leaving at intermission (it was a really bad play, that influenced the decision as well.)

I get home, use my land line to call my cell, nothing. I search the car with a flashlight, nothing. I recall the last time I used it was back at the other theater that will become my home away from home for the next two months, as we’re in pre-production on Polka Dotted Platypus, my new play. It must be at the theater. I bet it’s not.

I spent the rest of the weekend in a severe state of annoyance. Number one, because I’m now chained to my computer at home where the land line is because I have to be available via phone for some graphic design issues surrounding Polka Dotted Platypus, number two, I use my cell phone as my alarm clock, and now I don’t have an alarm clock and number three, I DON’T LOSE ANYTHING. Except my mind.

I get word last night that they checked the theater, and no cell phone. The only thing I think could’ve happened is that it fell out my car, purse, pocket, whatever, and is lying in the street or it got run over by a car somewhere. I change the outgoing message on the cell to reflect that you’d better email me or call my land line if you want to reach me, and I arranged to get another phone this morning, it should arrive sometime this week.

In a fit of weirdness, last month I had typed all my contacts from my cell phone into a Word document, in case something like this ever happened, so there’s no loss there.

But there were more than a few text messages I had saved over the years that are now gone. Some of them I saved to mark certain periods in my life. Some of them were quietly meaningful, and proof that at one point, some men found me attractive. Others were flat out blackmail material in case the wrong person crossed me. Some people keep scrapbooks, I kept old text messages.

The thought then becomes that this must be God telling me to move the f on, and not hold on to such reminders. But can reminders be bad? After all, you don’t see anyone losing photo albums from their wedding because it’s BAD to mark/remember and/or cherish things like that.

Does God really want us to walk around with an empty text message cache in our cell phones? Interesting to ponder, maybe.

Anyhow, if any of you texted me this weekend, I’m not ignoring you, I just didn’t get it. I should be back up and running by the end of the week, fingers crossed.

And I backed up my computer just to be safe.