Over the past week I’ve been thinking a lot about possessions and why I feel this urge to keep acquiring things.
A few months ago I bought an iPhone. It’s a really cool gadget but not so great at being a phone. I like the look of it. I like the features mostly. Being able to check my email anywhere is great (kind of) but it sucks as an iPod (the sound quality is really poor) and I can’t talk on it anywhere in the house except for right next to the front window.
So I’ve decided to get rid of it and just use my old phone. My old phone still works perfectly fine, actually a little better.
The grass was not greener on the other side of the fence.
I think the thing that triggered it was a couple weeks ago I got an email from Apple announcing the new iPhone. The tagline was ‘Twice as Fast. Half the Price’. It pissed me off. So now even though I just bought this thing 12 weeks ago, and paid quite a bit of money for it, I feel like a have a piece of junk because it’s not the shiny new version. Grr. I hate it so much. So screw them. I’ll have my 2 year old Motorola PEBL (which I really love) and send picture messages to everyone I know (can’t do this with the iPhone) and I’ll talk in every room of my house and I will be perfectly happy.
Marketing messages are really hard to ignore sometimes even when you’re fully aware that it’s all a game. I get sucked in. Apple is the worst for me. I don’t really care about cars or clothes or most material things but computers and iPods… They get me. I didn’t realize how much until I got that email and I felt that sinking feeling and the ‘Man I really want that one’ thing started going through my head.
I’m breaking the cycle. I already feel better…