punkt in the city
The first experiment started out with my friend and I driving downtown. As usual, we went to the coffee shop in order to ease into the day alongside mochas and cappuccinos.
My Punkt phone sat on the table as I looked at my hard copy notes. I couldn’t look up anything else on the World Wide Web which forced me to be present.
I was drafting a future post.
I actually ended up gazing at strangers because my mind was less distracted by my email, opinions gleaned from articles and podcasts that I’d exposed myself to that week, as well as the urge to search Ecosia. As someone with “high idea productivity,” I am often wanting to do this.
I also wasn’t able to look up as many things on a business before going there so that urge was lessened. And I didn’t have any of my blog post ideas as I keep them in a digital list. That will change now.
As an aside, since doing this experience, Punkt has become a line which I use now for emergencies and short term calls. Before, I was trying to make it my main phone line but an issue with the firmware has changed that (as an environmentalist, I got it refurbished when maybe I should have purchased it new).
I will continue to take it to the city where I want to read and write without distractions, but it is no longer employed for lengthy chats. I’m experimenting with using Signal and WhatsApp for family and friends and giving out my smartphone number for work and apps. So far, so good.
I wrote the draft by ink and paper and now I continue this practice, basking in the bliss of being offline. I felt the urge to listen to Indochine, a French rock band that’s been my top artist for many years, or “The Gray Area” podcast that I’ve listened to more and more these past months.
What’s been very freeing to experience has been the absence of notifications. Not even experiencing the possibility of perturbation.
Another experiment consisted of biking to a neighborhood coffee shop to draft another blog post accompanied by my dumb device and an iced matcha.
The larger experiment? I left my iPhone at home and drove to the Park and Ride eight minutes away, taking the paper timetables on the train with the Punkt in the pocket of my backpack.
I hoped that Punkt would work if anything happened as I would have had no way to call for an emergency, to call a Lyft, to reload my public transit card (although I could purchase a paper ticket at the station).
Ended up zoning out on the Frontrunner instead of grasping at more minutes to be productive. I’m discovering the joy of doing nothing during these times of waiting and wandering. On the platform, I enjoyed perusing a paperback. The audiobook I had just listened to at work titled “The End of Men” by Hanna Rosin was in my hands for a brief seven minutes before the streetcar arrived. Once I boarded the streetcar, I enjoyed people watching, zoning out once more.
Sauntered around the West Quarter, made a mental note of the new bike lanes, noting all this with no audio brimming in my ears, only the sounds of the mid-afternoon streets.
It was a successful experiment, one that I plan to do many times. The only downside? Not allowed to use the app-based rideshare system. I was definitely “hot in the city” like Billy Idol, but I also felt “punkt.”