What Irritates Me?

     When people use their phones while you're eating with them. Phones have taken such importance to our daily lives and most of our time and attention are into them, so why would you use them when your attention is supposed to already be taken by something else.This is a worldwide issue. Everywhere I go, phones are always with us. 

     I grew up not being allowed to use electronics while eating with people, in my opinion it is basic human respect. We already see phones all over the place, why ruin my appetite using it while I’m eating. The point of eating with people at a table is to have conversations with them, talk about our life and update each other, but the second someone I am eating with gets their phone out and interrupts me to check their emails or latest texts, I feel super disrespected. What do you mean we were talking about roller coasters and you get your phone out which proceeds to end the conversation?? 

     My boyfriend uses his phone while we're eating sometimes. It’s an ick. I always start grimacing or become nonverbal when he does it. The worst is when he just isn’t listening to me anymore and the phone just cut me out of the conversation completely. Maybe he should just go on a date with his phone, maybe it will be more interesting than me. What is the point of inviting someone to a fancy dinner, taking hours to get ready and then using your phone and saying something like “Sorry, Kanye just posted a new pic on insta”...okay. I love my boyfriend and he is amazing but I think he is suffering from the cellphone chicken pox, it irritates him to not use his phone for more than a few seconds. Of course it’s okay to check your phone for a couple seconds, maybe someone is calling you or you received an important email concerning your job, but it shouldn’t be more than that. I am eating with you, I took time from my day and I decided out of everyone else in this world to eat with you and you are not gonna spend the whole dinner on your phone ignoring me. In the future I am planning to install this rule that if you are at a table, eating with people, no phones should be seen at any point unless everyone is included like showing a picture to your family of what you did that same day. 

     In the 18th and at the beginning of the 19th century, people had much better mental health than now. This could be because they talked more and they were more social. Women around entire neighborhoods would meet a couple of times a week and talk about everything. They didn't have technology to interrupt them, even less phones. I think  one of the main components of our bad mental health today would be because people are much less open to talking to others. I mean the amount of things people have missed out on being on a cellphone could be equivalent to centuries of lost conversations. The idea that phones are taking our personal lives is frustrating. I don’t want my future kids to grow up in a world where they are not being heard from technology taking their voices from them.

     The point is that technology is ruining such basic human time and people should know how to respect the ones they are eating with. There should be a break between the cellphone life and the personal life or else they will miss everything that is awaiting for them. When I am eating with you, I want to remember this conversation for months later and be happy about it, not just another double date with you and your cell phone.  

Chloe Askinazi