I did a small offline break, very of me. (Alex documented his offline time in a wonderful post here. It’s got Apple execs CHAIN SMOKING, I’d bet.)
I realised that my extravert battery is flat for the year and I have no more desire to engage with people. After a certain point one just becomes bad company, darlings. For the fear of completing the transformation, I’ve taken Christmas Eve and Day off from online interactions with people, in the hope of getting reacquainted with my children.
The point wasn’t really to go offline, or off the phone. I’m still happily in denial about the screen time ruining my life (“There HAS to be another way to lose weight,” she said, picking up another donut). I felt an acute desire to hear myself think again over a never ending stream of continuous online conversations, group chats, meme exchanges. Two days don’t do much to help with this, but I take any longer and my mother calls the police.
When I got into bed and unlocked my phone, I didn’t know what to do. Without anyone to respond to, can I just… go to sleep? Is that allowed? Is it even… legal? Feeling an unwelcome existential crisis approaching I distracted myself by doing what dreamers do in London, and opened Rightmove to do some house hunting.
A quick search confirmed my hypothesis that only the dreaming can be done in London, and the living might need to be done somewhere else. That’s if we want earthly comforts like an indoor toilet and windows and like… walls idk.
I entertained the idea of moving to Edinburgh. The thought of my girls picking up a Scottish accent distracts me from giving due consideration to what the hell I would be doing in Edinburgh; far from my mom, any friends, and the hope of ever seeing the sun again.
Took me one day without arguing about aim assist on the the Call of Duty subreddit to realise I have no direction in life. Not even literally, as in, geographically.
***
A few days after this we were forced into a more serious hiatus. Our WiFi started acting up around 5 pm on Thursday, going off and on and off again. On Friday it was down all day. Jules spent about 3 hours on the phone with a representative of the Internet People trying to get it sorted.
In the process of figuring out what was wrong with our WiFi they somehow flipped the switch for the entire building. Hundreds of apartments without online access.
“Ours started acting up around 5:30 last night,” a disgruntled resident writes on our building bulletin board. This would have been about two hours into Jules’ adventure of trying to get it fixed.
“Does anyone know what happened? The company are asking if anything happened in the building yesterday.”
"Ah yes, us too,” I say. “5:30ish, yes.”
Right, like you’d admit to being the index patient for an apocalyptic event like this. New Year’s without internet? How would we even have confirmation that 2024 is here already? We’ll be like “Hey Siri, is the future now?” and Siri will be like: “Dude idk".
***
I’ll start celebrating with Vladivostok of course, as usual. I write my wishes on tiny tiny pieces of paper, burn them into champagne flutes, and drink the ashes. My dreams always come true.
For the first time since the gas leak 2020/21 year and for the second time in my whole life we have no plans for New Years eve. Seems appropriate this year, it’s been an exhausting month. A quiet time at home chopping salads, burning wishes into champagne, and video calling family in every earthly timezone is exactly what this household needs.
In the two days without WiFi (it’s Saturday now, still nothing) I have managed to get to the bottom of The Laundry Pile, a fixture I grew to consider permanent and to, actually, quite like. Will have to get a plant to put there now, or something.
I went for a run; we sorted out and fully reorganised the pantry. The children had a screen free day for the first time in weeks. I’ve made solid progress on the books I’m reading, and the post I’ve been trying to figure out how to approach.
Wait, there’s a tingling sensation in my brain. I hate being taught things, and this feels a lot like the universe is trying to teach me something. For the life of me, can’t figure out what. It’s right there, at the tip of my tongue.
Don’t tell me, I’ll figure it out in 2024. I’ll see you then, friend.
Now, I rest. Thank you so much for this year1. <3
yes, you.
This is glorious, happy 2024 awesome one!
Wishing you and yours an absolutely wonderful 2024, Ani. xo