I wish I had gotten this whole thing on video to show you, but you’ll just have to bare with me as I tell this long-winded story.
Last Friday, I woke up like any other day. I went downstairs, made myself an iced coffee, and worked my way back upstairs. Kris called me into our bedroom asking me if I was going on my laptop.
“Probably. Why?” I asked peering over her shoulder as she stared at her laptop’s desktop.
“I’m going to shut the modem off.” she explained.
Our bedroom was never very good at catching the wi-fi. It’s always been spotty in there, we have no idea why. But Kris is always able to troubleshoot it and then it comes back to her no problem. Except, this time, it was saying the modem was having issues. Kris thought to reset it assuming that would fix the problem.
I shrugged. “Go for it.” I was going to be home all day. I didn’t have to start writing or blogging right at seven-thirty in the morning.
I’ll skip some of the boring details, but when I went downstairs, Kris was sitting in the porch pouting. She had brought her laptop down there with her, hoping it would give her a better connection.
It didn’t.
I looked over at the modem and frowned upon seeing it glare back at me with a bright red light.
“What’d you do to it?” I asked.
Kris glared at me. “I didn’t do anything to it! It wasn’t working, so I reset it and it still won’t come on.” she stood up from the couch and unplugged the modem. She waited ten seconds before plugging it back in.
The wi-fi symbol turned on, but the earth symbol blinked white.
“It’s trying.” she said.
We watched it in silence willing the blinking to stop. When it finally did, we didn’t sigh in relief.
“Why is it red?!” Kris growled. She leaned back on the couch running her finger along the screen of her smart phone. I laughed. This was ridiculous. She was trying to look up ways to fix it on the Internet, but that was difficult since we had no Internet.
Kris and I panicked a bit. What would we do without Internet?
You don’t realize how much you use the Internet until it’s gone. My first instinct was to live tweet about the situation. Except, I couldn’t get onto Twitter. Nothing on my phone worked except my text messages.
I couldn’t check my blog, Facebook, Twitch, Pinterest, Tumblr, anything.
I worked a lot on writing and blogging last week and was stressing myself out since I have to go back to work soon. So, in a way, this was a good thing. The Internet was trying to tell me something.
“Well, I have to get ready for work. We’ll just have to try again later.” Kris got up from the couch and made her way upstairs.
I remained where I stood dumbfounded. What was I supposed to do all day?
I couldn’t get onto my laptop at all. I supposed I could try to write since Word doesn’t need Internet. I figured I could read since I needed a book review for the following day. I could play video games. I couldn’t watch TV though. I mean, I could have, but the TV I watch is Netflix and YouTube. Both need Internet.
I decided to play video games. I needed to for Double Jump, but as soon as I turned on my game, I needed to look something up. So, I grabbed my phone and tried the Internet completely forgetting that you need Internet to get on the Internet… Yeah.
With our phones and technology right at the end of our fingertips, it’s amazing how many times a day you say, “Let me Google that.”
But I couldn’t because I had no Internet.
I played video games for a bit, I read a book, and that’s about it. Everyone was at work and I was home alone. There’s not much you can do when there’s no Internet and you work online.
I was born in the 90s. I remember sitting on the bulky desktop computer playing Paint, Solitaire, or Pinball, waiting for my mom to get off the phone because you couldn’t talk on the phone and be on the Internet at the same time.
I didn’t grow up attached to my cell phone because I didn’t get one until I was 16. I didn’t need one and there wasn’t much you could do with it to begin with.
I never watched YouTube, I didn’t have Netflix, I didn’t have an iPad that needed Internet for apps.
No, I went outside and I played with my friends. I took walks. I used my imagination.
I mean, I still use my imagination every day, but I don’t run outside acting it out with my sister. I just write it down instead.
What happened on Friday sparked three more post ideas for this blog and one post idea for my other blog. So, I guess everything happens for a reason, huh?
What would you do if the Internet crashed on you? Would it be easy for you to get through the day or would you just sit and twiddle your thumbs?
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