Phones are necessary evils in families

Phones are mobile devices that connect us to the world at large. Almost everyone now possesses a phone, and as little as the under fives have iPads to play with. You can practically meet everyone on social media. There are millions of interesting things on our phones that constantly draw our attention to them, irrespective of our age limits or interests.

Our phones have brought us numerous friends, some of whom we can even call family. Hive is a typical example, and others are Facebook, Instagram, etc. Being online via our phones is actually exciting, and if I should quantify the number of hours spent on the phone, it'll be about a quarter to half of our awake periods. The world has gone digital, and owning an Android phone probably would put the user on the desire and urge to always be online. Whenever my data is down, I usually have a feeling of being cut off from the world, and I make many efforts to come back online as soon as possible. In fact, I'd prefer to be out of airtime than to be out of data. Call the phone an addiction, but most of our lives revolve around our mobile phones.

A few families, like mine, have gone ahead and created a WhatsApp group where family issues and updates are constantly communicated. My family has a similar WhatsApp group, but just for the children. Our parents hardly use WhatsApp, and they prefer our presence or voice to just seeing messages from us.

Since we have all grown apart and are sparsely located in various states of the country, a complete family reunion has been difficult. The last time we had a complete family where my siblings were complete was three years ago, and it was just for about 72 hours as my oldest brother had to travel almost immediately.

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During the period that we got together, my oldest brother was almost always on his phone. He got a two-week leave after about four years of working without one, and he needed to be in different places within that short span of time. He was also a superior at work, and he had to stay abreast of updates at his workplace. We enjoyed his presence, but we had to deal with his constant click on the phone, which was understandable. We had occasional times when we gathered in the sitting room and reflected on past occurrences as regards life and school work. It was nostalgic; we enjoyed the memories.

This will be difficult for my family to implement. The truth is that when there is no life, life continues. But for the fact that we are still alive, we have roles and responsibilities to adhere to. My oldest brother, for example, is so busy that I pity him often and constantly advise him to find time to rest. I am equally busy but flexible. My nature of work requires me to have access to my phone, often to resolve health issues as they relate to patients and hospitals.

As much as we may desire to have family time together without our phones, it'll be difficult to achieve seeing that we are all grown up and have roles and responsibilities to attend to via the available social networks.

Thank you for reading. I would love to have your comments and contributions.