Life Unwritten
20.
I love life.
I love Jesus.
I love my friends more than anything in this world.
Appalachian State University!
Teacher.
Dreamer.
Lover.
Friend.
Happy.
A day in the life without media is so much harder than it seems, media surrounds us everywhere. Literally walking through the coffee shop on campus I couldn’t go say hey to my friends because every single one of them had their laptops pulled up with facebook or some other site logged in. I started my fast when I woke up Monday morning at around 9am to go to class, i had to pick this day because it was my only day off and my job requires me to work with computers. I could have done it on Sunday but I really wanted to go to church and in church we listen to music and they even project the lyrics and videos on a giant pull down screen. This all just exemplifies how much media surrounds us and how hard it is to escape it even for 24 hours, this is what I did with my rare time of no media.
( My roommate’s new record that we got )
After I got out of class at 3:15 I went back to the dorm and my roommate suggested that we go shop on King Street. Normally I would have probably said no because either I had to much to do or just wanted to relax and watch tv, however in light of this project I decided to say yes and go for it. We ended up spending most of our time in the record store and my roommate purchased the one in the picture. We were a little bummed that we couldn’t listen to it right away because we couldn’t decide whether or not listening to music that way was considered media. It was a nice time and we were happy to finally spend some time together that wasn’t conversing from behind laptops or simply watching a movie together.
( My pile of textbooks and homework )
Homework is obviously not something that is usually on the top of a college student’s to do list even though it is probably the most important. I never usually start my homework until midnight or later, for example it is now almost 11:00 while I am doing this homework now that I am no longer fasting. I got out of class at 3:15 and went back to my dorm to do homework, my roommate even joined since we couldn’t turn on our television or listen to the radio. With no distraction we finished our usual homework load in about two hours compared to the four hours it usually takes with facebook and tv distractions. It was amazingly peaceful to spend the rest of the evening knowing I had already finished everything I needed to and it opened the door to do other things as well!!
( The book I am currently reading )
After I finished my homework I decided to read for about an hour or so and in that time I finished the book Mockingjay and went on to start reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I have been really excited to start this series and it was nice to finally get the chance to. I am an english major so naturally I am a big nerd when it comes to reading and I love spending my time with a good book though I rarely have time. It was very refreshing and relaxing to sit back and enjoy my time reading with nothing else lingering on my mind, like homework or what is on tv that night.
( laundry bag!! )
While we were doing homework I figured that would be a good time to do my laundry and kill two birds with one stone. In all honesty if I hadn’t been made to do this assignment that probably would have been put off for a couple more days, I get so lazy when it comes to laundry. However, while we were doing homework I even forgot I was doing laundry but I got everything done that I needed to. It was really weird to realize everything that I can get done when I am not glued to my technology!
( Our organized bookshelf )
After reading for a while I got antsy and wanted to get up and do something so I decided to clean up the dorm room a bit and organize our closet which was very messy. My roommate and I have a ton of books so we straightened up our make shift book shelf and cleaned up everything really well. We laughed about it afterwards because everything looked really good but if I had not been doing this experiment we would have been watching tv or listening to music instead and made up some excuse in order to not do. Proof that media dictates what we do in our lives.
( Miniature cupcakes! )
One of my good friends got mad at me because I didn’t answer her text ( whoops I forgot to tell her! ) so she came to my room to see what’s up. She said since you guys are not doing anything do you want to come downstairs and make some cupcakes. We had so much fun making them and decorating them and of course eating them and we didn’t have any technology in the background. It reminded us how much we rely on media to make us happy and entertained and we remembered that we could make ourselves enjoy life without it. Our bellies were stuffed and our smiles were large and it was a great time that we may not have had if this task had not been assigned.
( My favorite snowboard )
After cupcakes the three of us decided to go snowboarding ( one of our favorite pastimes ) for the rest of the night. We joked saying that we couldn’t take pictures or tape and videos and then we realized it was true.. oh well! We went for about three hours then we all got so exhausted we decided to head home. It was so much fun, my friend was just learning so we helped her improve while my roommate and I who are more advanced attempted some new tricks and other stuff that we have been wanting to do. It was so awesome to enjoy that time while having no homework to do after we got home, you can relax so much more when you have nothing else to do. I probably will continue to be a procrastinator and wait until the last minute to do homework but for that one night it was a great experience and a really fun time!
( my gym shoes )
Okay this is the part of the project where I got really frustrated, realizing all the things that I had to cut out of my daily routine was a bit annoying. I realized that I couldn’t go to the gym I usually go to because they play television at the front of the room and there would be no way around that. This is obviously just one example of what we had to give up in order to complete this; I couldn’t go to the movies with my friends, I couldn’t call my family or text my friends, there is so much media involved in our everyday lives it seems to consume us. Though I couldn’t go to the gym I still found other ways to pass the time by.
( I asked my roommate to take a picture of the clock when we were going to bed )
My roommate, although not fully, did attempt to complete this project with me and when I said I was going to bed - mostly due to boredom - she decided to go as well. After we got home from snowboarding we were exhausted anyway and since we couldn’t turn on the television or hop onto our laptops we simply decided to go to bed and catch up on some sleep. ALthough this was motivated by boredom we were so glad we did it and we felt so energized the next day. The two of us don’t really sleep as much as we should so this was definitely a turn of events for us.
( Me reading the New York Times )
The next morning I woke up about an hour earlier than I needed to because I went to bed so early and instead of going back to bed I decided to spend my last hour of the digital fast reading my newspaper. I ended up reading three of them, I pick up a New York Times every morning but I don’t always have time to read them that day so I save them for later and I was able to catch up that morning. Now I will admit that although this experience was fulfilling and even fun, I did find it very aggravating at some points and as soon as time was up I immediately reached for my cell phone. I had 14 text messages and 18 facebook notifications, it was so ridiculous but it just proved how much we rely on media for our communication and social interactions. I really liked this experience but I probably wouldn’t want to do it again! Just because it was a fun experience doesn’t mean I would want to live like that, I am set in my ways and I would probably drive myself crazy if I had to be cut off for more than 24 hours!
holy sh—!! I just realized that “Monique from She’s the man”
and the red head slut maid from American horror story
is actually the same actress!!!! OMG call me slow, I never realized before…
oooooohhhhhh why must life be so hard…
