From a 最高の，を越す TV writer, a surprising 自白 that 明らかにする／漏らすs so much about modern life... I thought a week without a smartphone would be 解放するing. But I’ve never felt so 強調する／ストレスd

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A reasonably resourceful person who, with a bit of willpower and a 確かな 量 of 断言するing, can 取り組む most things (except tyre-?changing and long 分割). That’s how I think of myself.?

So when I’m asked if I will give up my smartphone for a Nokia ‘brick’ phone for a week, I think, why not? After all, I spent the first half of my life without a 動きやすい phone, 生き残るing without texts or Google 地図／計画するs. So surely I can manage a week. Really, how hard can it be??

Instead of my snazzy iPhone 12 I am given an un-smartphone, a Nokia 109, not so much of a brick as a pebble but with no internet 接近. Just the 肉親，親類d of phone Children’s Commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza recently advised parents to buy for their children, to help 離乳する them off social マスコミ.?

The good news is it’s small and light, and easily fits into my pocket. As I put my sim card into the dinky phone, I feel a twinge of nostalgia for the first 動きやすい I ev er bought, a Motorola flip phone that would comfortably fit in the smallest evening 捕らえる、獲得する. I 明確に had better eyesight then; it’s a struggle to 完全にする 始める，決める-up on the tiny 1.77in 審査する. By comparison, my iPhone 審査する 対策 6in.?

Daisy Goodwin (pictured) thought it would be 平易な to give up her smartphone for a week. The UK-based 新聞記者／雑誌記者 swapped her phone for an 古代の Nokia 'brick' phone

First up, I have lunch with my aunt. She wants to see a picture of my girls. I reach for my phone . . . and realise my Nokia doesn’t even have a camera. I think wistfully of the creased snaps I used to carry around in my wallet and 公約する to print some of the millions of pictures I 蓄える／店 in the cloud.?

It’s my first experience of what is 存在 称する，呼ぶ／期間／用語d ‘数字表示式の 除外’, the 広げるing gap between those of us keeping up with 科学（工学）技術 (or just about), and those in danger of 落ちるing far behind.?

As more and more 面s of our day-today lives are given over to ‘high tech’ 解答s, many people 危険 存在 unable to 接近 e ssential services. Even buying groceries can become a challenge. Earlier this year Tesco 直面するd a （激しい）反発 from 顧客s for introducing yet more self-service checkouts across its 蓄える／店s, with nearly a ４半期/4分の1 of a million 署名s 需要・要求するing that it ‘stop the 交替／補充 of people by machines’.?

The 問題／発行する is 最高潮の場面d by the 最新の 人物／姿／数字s from Ofcom, which show only 55 per cent of over-65s use a smartphone and that ‘数字表示式の poverty’ is a 障壁 直面するing about 11.3million people in the UK. Even if cost isn’t an 問題／発行する, people may 簡単に be sticking to habits that have served them 井戸／弁護士席 ― such as using cash rather than a banking app ― but which now leave them at a disadvantage.?

The charity Age UK has 警告するd that drivers are 存在 penalised for 存在 unable to 支払う／賃金 for parking through an app, since many car parks now 告発（する），告訴（する）／料金 more if you use cash. From dating to shopping to ordering a takeaway, smartphones are now an integral part of life.?

Daisy?設立する the week difficult, 結論するing that smartphones have become an 必須の part of the fabric of daily life in the 21st century

Cycling home from lunch, I hear a noise that takes me 支援する to that Dom Joly sketch where the comedian walked around with a 抱擁する?phone (it’d （犯罪の）一味 somewhere public, ?then he’d bellow into it: ‘I’m on my 動きやすい!’). I stop cycling ― no Bluetooth airbuds with this baby ― to answer the call.

‘Hello,’ says a polite but rather chilly 発言する／表明する. ‘Weren’t we meant to be having a Zoom call now?’?

Whoops! Without the calendar 機能（する）／行事 that reminds me about my 近づいている 会合s, I have 完全に forgotten I’m meant to be talking to a TV 生産者 about a new 事業／計画（する）. I explain what has happened and my 報知係 laughs.?

‘Oh, that explains why when I sent you a text it went green instead of blue [示すing the receiver doesn’t have an iPhone].?

‘I always think those people are technologically 無学の.’?

Once home, I decide to 元気づける myself up by buying the green shoes I have been lusting after for months and which have just gone on sale. I 料金d my 詳細（に述べる）s into my laptop, but have forgotten about the two-factor authentication so often baked into the online 購入（する）ing 過程.?

I can receive the 自動化するd 安全 text on my tiny phone, but I can’t 接近 the bank app that lets me 確認する the 処理／取引 is 本物の. No shoes for me.?

Waking up the next morning is 荒涼とした. My usual 決まりきった仕事 is to listen to 無線で通信する 4, read the papers on my phone and get my brain in gear with Wordle. Without my smartphone, 非，不，無 of that is possible.?

My 無線で通信する is co ntrolled by an app; even my coffee machine is controlled by my phone, and I can’t remember how to work it without it.?

I run 負かす／撃墜する the street to get a takeaway coffee, but have forgotten that the pebble (as I now 言及する to my old-fashioned 動きやすい) can’t 支払う／賃金 for things like my trusty smartphone. The wallet 機能（する）／行事 means I rarely need my actual bank card any more.?

I am caffeine-奪うd and underinformed by the time I reach the London Library, where I like to work. It was a boring 旅行, because I usually listen to podcasts 経由で my smartphone, and I ran out of 殴打／砲列 on my e-bike because that is 手段d by an app, so I didn’t notice it was nearly out of juice. Still, I 高く評価する／（相場などが）上がるd the sounds of Central London and I had an idea for a new script, so maybe it wasn’t all bad ― and I was safer without distraction.?

Inside the library, not having my 集中 穴をあけるd by the constant pinging of WhatsApp groups I’m too 脅すd to leave is a 限定された 加える ーに関して／ーの点でs of my 生産性. Likewise, not having 接近 to an Instagram 直す／買収する，八百長をする is definitely good for my work, my self-esteem and my bank balance (I’m an impulse Insta 買い手).?

But my smug 存在-現在の-in-the moment serenity is 粉々にするd when I start to get texts from my daughter?about what she would like for her 22nd birthday. Every text is 発表するd by a loud beep, and while you can turn 負かす／撃墜する the ringer on the pebble phone, texts 証明する impossible to silence (at least, I can’t 割れ目 it). As my younger daughter is a 数字表示式の native who texts faster than I think, my phone is becoming a public nuisance in the hallowed 静かな of the library.?

I try to text her to stop texting me, but typing on a numeric keyboard ― where you have to 圧力（をかける） the 7 重要な four times to get an S ― is like 選ぶing up individual 穀物s of rice, so it takes me about ten minutes to manage ‘STOP’. Then, I call her, forgetting anyone under 30 doesn’t use a phone to talk unless it’s for a ビデオ call, and so answering a （犯罪の）一味ing phone is as unfamiliar a 概念 as a 黒人／ボイコット-and-white television.?

In the end, I 包む the phone in a jumper and stash it in the 底（に届く） of my 捕らえる、獲得する.?

The に引き続いて evening, I take my father to the theatre. He may be in his 80s, but he is the person I （犯罪の）一味 whenever I have a tech problem. When I explain I am spending a week with a ‘dumb’ phone, he is 関心d for my mental health. He is rightly worried, it turns out, because I ordered e-tickets ― which are inaccessible without a smartphone.?

After 打ち勝つing that 障害物 thanks to the patience of the box office staff, and after three hours of a terrific show, we 現れる to find that the car I 調書をとる／予約するd 経由で an app a week ago to take my 年輩の father home has not turned up and I have no way of 跡をつけるing it 負かす／撃墜する. Twenty minutes later we find a cab on the street, and I 悪口を言う／悪態 my 欠如（する） of connectivity for spoiling a fabulous evening.?

By this point in the week, my 血 圧力 is rising 刻々と with all the 失望／欲求不満s of 存在 削減（する） off from my 数字表示式の 超大国s.?

At least, I think it is, but I can’t be sure because I can’t 手段 it without the handy app that links to my 圧力 cuff.?

I also can’t use my meditation app or my yoga app, or even the tracker that tells me how many steps I have managed that day. This is demotivating; it doesn’t 事柄 how many miles I am walking, if they aren’t 記録，記録的な／記録するd they don’t count.?

What’s more, my streak of 76 連続した days of learning Italian 経由で the Duolingo app has been broken, which is a serious blow. I don’t know how good it is for my Italian, but I was feeling pretty smug about getting to its ‘?Emerald League’ of learners.?

But life must go on ― and I have to go to Oxford for the day for some?研究. I 普通は buy my ticket the day before on the Trainline app ― it’s 平易な, convenient and cheap (you get a 割引 if you 調書をとる／予約する online in 前進する).?

This time, I 勇敢に立ち向かう the machine and get my ticket, but then realise, too late, my 上級の Railcard is on my smartphone and I have no hard copy of it on me. Will the ticket 視察官 believe I am over 60 without 数字表示式の 立証? The short answer is no.?

So what I have saved by not buying those green shoes, I 結局最後にはーなる spending on 昇格ing my ticket. And what would someone do, I muse, if they needed some help with 調書をとる／予約するing their 旅行? Like High Street bank 支店s and 田舎の 地位，任命する Offices, ticket offices are passing into memory in many places, and an app can’t 取って代わる all they do.?

My reverie is interrupted by a call from my daughter, asking if we can go out to dinner that night for her 22nd birthday. I agree to 調書をとる／予約する a restaurant ― but soon realise such a thing is impossible without 接近 to the internet unless I’d memorised a restaurant’s phone number (and even then, some 受託する 保留（地）／予約s only online).?

In the end I have to phone my husband and get him to do it.?

On the way to the restaurant, I 急ぐ into Liberty’s to buy her a birthday 現在の, thinking that at last I can redeem some of the points on my 忠義 card. But again, I forget: no smartphone, no proof. In the end, a 肉親，親類d lady looks me up on her system?and agrees that I might 井戸／弁護士席 be who I say I am and lets me use my points.?

By this time, I am running late and have no way of getting in touch with the restaurant to let them know I am on my way ― I don’t know the number, and without Google 地図／計画するs to tell me their 演説（する）／住所 I am sunk. In the end, my husband tells me where to go. It makes me realise how good at 今後 planning I was 30 years ago, with an A-Z and a Filofax 十分な of useful numbers.?

At the restaurant, when the cake 現れるs, I am gutted I can’t take my usual out-of-焦点（を合わせる） 発射 of a child blowing out birthday candles.?

I’d love to say that at the end of a week off-grid, I am a wiser, saner person. But I feel like Superman after a 小衝突 with the Kryptonite that 略奪するs him of his 力／強力にするs.?

There are definitely 加えるs. Anything that （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域s the algorithm that is 絶えず trying to sell us more stuff is a good thing, and the fact a Nokia only needs 非難する once a week feels miraculous. But I feel that a smartphone has become the 数字表示式の 同等（の） to a washing machine; the pebble is the 2022 同等（の） of a mangle.?

In 未来, I’ll spare more of a thought for those of us who, whether by habit, choice or circumstance, now find themselves navigating life without one.