I am a junkie

My name is Angela and I am a cell phone junkie.

Whoo, there I finally said it.

I never knew I had a problem. My friends pointed it out to me time and time again. But still, I ignored their pleas to straigten up. Finally, something inside me just clicked.

I don't go anywhere without my cell phone. The mere thought of it not being on me at all times, well that can send me into panic overload. I have been half way to work and needed to turn around and go back and get it.

It is always at arms length. It sits on my desk, in eyes view. It is on my lap while in the car. I carry it around my house while I clean from room to room. It stays in my apron pocket when I work at the bookstore. When I take a shower it is on the toilet seat and when I go t to bed at night, well it sleeps on the pillow next to me.

I can't make it through a family dinner or being out with friends without carrying on two or more conversations via text while still chatting away with whomever is across the table. While in meetings you can always hear the silent vibration of a cell coming from someones purse (mine) and everyone always giggles that it is constantly ringing.

My cellular obsession is becoming a problem. And it is high time that something be done about it. It is interfering with my job and friends and family. It is a very serious additction and I would like to get it under control be for it controls my life and eventually takes over.

I have decided that since it is an addiction, that a 12 step program would be the best place to start:

STEP#1: "I admit we were powerless over cell usage-- that my life has become unmanageable."
STEP#2: "Came to believe that a Power greater than myself can restore me to sanity."
STEP#3: "I have made a decision to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand Him." (Emphasis in original.)
STEP#4: "Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of my life."
STEP#5: "Admitted to God, to myslef, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs."
STEP#6: "I am entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character."
STEP#7: "Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings."
STEP#8: "Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all."
STEP#9: "Made direct amends to such people whenever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others."
STEP#10: "Continued to take a personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it."
STEP#11: "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out." (Emphasis in original.)
STEP#12: "Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to cell phone junkies, and to practice these principles."

I know to some of you this may be really stupid. And yes, it is funny to write this out. But I am seriously addicted to my cell phone. My friends are tired of coming second conversation in the middle of dinner and movies and cookouts just so I can answer who is ringing in an this little plastic contraption.

Anyway. When things from the outside world start replacing those that are most important. Well its time to make a change.

My first order of business: I am going to turn this little booger off on Sunday. It's God's day. It's the Sabbath, and maybe I should start there and keep it holy. So, as my friends. Stand by me on my new found quest. Starting Sunday my phone will be off. I will not answer calls or text.

This is Angela and I am a cell phone junkie