strike that

withdrawl

Brad moved out. He was the MBA student whom I rarely spoke about here, because he rarely spoke much at all. If I had to guess I’d say that it wasn’t so much shyness as that he just didn’t like me. I don’t think he disliked me, exactly – though I think he disliked my music and my occasional chattiness and my less occasional dirty dishes. But lack of dislike is no good way to keep house, so he packed up and crossed the river.

Brad took the kitchen radio and the pasta pot and the table lamp with him, but most critically he took our internet connection. He took the account in his name and the little blinking magic box o’ wireless. And suddenly things around the house are very different. Now when I get home I no longer open up the laptop automatically, and it’s not where I go after dinner just to check my email. Instead this week I’ve been reading and gluing things together and cooking with the Roommate Who Remains, and generally not missing the internet much at all.

Today the city job ended early, so I biked through the sharp freezing rain to the coffee shop where I’m writing now, a dim hipster spot called Tiny’s. There are five laptops, four messenger bags, and one large dog amongst the nine customers, who are arrayed on barstools and loungy sofas and retro swivel chairs. NPR’s classical FM station is playing at a pleasantly loud volume. There is a wall of fliers. The painting to my left is for sale.

I am sipping a small but tasty café au lait and wondering what it is I do online for all those hours I spend there. I read a handful of blogs, but most of them have been low on posts lately. I meander around Craigslist. I take long erratic voyages through Wikipedia.

It’s likely that when Brad 2.0 – who I believe prefers being called Winslow – moves in this week, he will restore our internet connection. To my great surprise I think I could take it or leave it. I’m not an anti-technology convenience-scorning Luddite and I’m not a gadget freak; I’m somewhere in the wide uninteresting middle: a place populated by cellphones and instant messaging, but free of microwaves and TV. I’m the type of person who buys an external hard drive, but I buy one exactly the size I need, even though twenty dollars more gets twice the size. I like new electronics but then I use them for as long as they work, and then as long as the duct tape holds them together. I blog, but my Sunday paper’s made of paper.

And I love the ease of the accessible universe from my bedroom. I love that I can read about rhododendrons at whim and get mail at two in the morning. But here I am right now of necessity, surrounded by organic juices and a rack of zines and a Ripley’s Believe It Or Not pinball game and girls in hand-knit hats. And I’m thankful for the inconvenience.

posted by tortaluga @ 4:21 PM