It might be an age-related dellusion but Bill felt that time was speeding up

since the pandemic. Without a new earth-shattering gizmo, an overseas vacation,

a family reunion, a job switch, or a foot race, two years were gone. A day still

consisted of 24 hours but didn't seem to pack as much life as it used to. Cheap

minutes must have been printed somewhere and diluted the worth of the hour. On

the flip side, would the average lifespan be accordingly inflated? He was not sure. 

In the midst of unrelenting change, Bill had tried to hold onto the past, which 

was like trying to dodge a bulldozer. He had resisted the smartphone, e.g., from

day one and it was not because he once worked for Nokia. In front of a laptop

all day, he never saw the need for intelligence in a phone. From his point of

view, all the smartness in the device worked to exploit human weaknesses for

profit at the cost of people's attention span and maybe even self-esteem. He had

stuck with dumb phones as if the smart ones were never invented.

Two years ago, he had to give up his $29 2G flip phone when he moved to this

city on the Peninsula as the old network had been demolished here long ago. His

solution was a $49 3G phone. The signals were sketchy at a few spots but he 

didn't mind: except for his wife and kid, almost no one called him and the

device was used mainly for receiving one-time access codes for work. Besides,

whoever did call could always leave a message. The phone had served him well

until lately T-Mobile announced plans to once again ditch older technology.

After a 20-minute research, Bill purchased online an $89 4G Easyfone which came

in three days. Without a moving part, it looked sturdy and felt snug in his

palm. With large buttons, a camera, a torch light, long battery life, and an LED

screen where one could see the time at the push of a button, the phone was

exactly what he needed. It took him a 15-minute walk to the nearby T-Mobile

store where he upgraded to a small-form SIM card for $10. He had to explain to

the guys there that this was for someone else. Other than that, business was

done in 10 minutes and, until they tear down 4G, he got a new lease on phone 

life. Phones had become smart around 2007 and therefore Bill had stayed dumb for

15 years.