So, I finally upgraded from my mom’s iPhone5 to an iPhone SE a couple of weeks ago. Not that big of deal, right? Wrong.

I’ve had the same Chicago cell phone number for at least the past 19 years, but along with living in 7 or 8 different residences during this time, I’ve had a similar number of cell phones. Terry and I both upgraded to iPhones in 2009, which was pretty exciting. I’m a Mac Girl from way back because Apple (Macintosh) computers have been so intuitive through the years, and I appreciate how iPhones have definitely followed in the same tradition.

However, they have definitely not been the cheapest option, so when my first iPhone was stolen during my first week teaching at my first school in New Orleans in January 2010 and my replacement was stolen from my car, which was parked near school, 5 months later, I wasn’t going to replace it with another iPhone. Nope. Not going to happen. On punishment, I got a trac phone! Remember those??? 😜 An adequate little phone, however, it definitely lacked the bells and whistles of my iPhone.

A couple of years go by, and I’m finally up for an upgrade on our data plan and jump back in the mix with an iPhone! Super excited. And then I leave my cell phone on the seat of a cab in NOLA. Back on punishment for me–and my trac phone.

I can’t remember if there was another phone thrown in there, but by summer of 2017 I was ready for some kind of upgrade, any upgrade, and so in the midst of a period of rigid austerity, I gladly accepted a ‘hand me down’ iPhone 5 from my mom. And it worked fine, except it didn’t have enough storage! That became an issue right away, but I learned to live with it and make do.

However, by this year, it was becoming pretty ridiculous, but I was stuck. I’d adapted my use so that I got by and was able to make it work. It was a good phone and I could use enough of my apps, so why fuss? So many other things going on in our world to prioritize and geez, it’s not like I have a great track record of taking care of my iPhones. Except, I couldn’t access Facebook Messenger or login to Word Press or download the app for City of Chicago parking or download the new ROW (Recovery on Water) team app that came out in August or…

It was not being able to download the app for City of Chicago parking that was the final straw. I got a stiff parking ticket a month ago because I didn’t have the app programmed into my phone (thanks to not having enough space in the phone) and realized it was truly time.

And, I finally took the leap. In the midst of new COVID restrictions. These new restrictions meant that despite all of the advertising that AT&T was blasting about their people doing all of the data transfer to your new phone, I had to do it by myself (and I was terrified).

It’s been a considerable learning curve, but I’m so excited to relearn how to use my iPhone for more than just the basics! Having 256KB of storage space might be overkill, but the space and an updated iOS of 14.2 is huge. I’ve been downloading new apps each day and discovering new bells and whistles with my old ones. I even downloaded the WordPress app and wrote most of this post on my new phone!

Now that this area of my life is unstuck, what is next to work on? It makes me realize we all have things going on in our lives where we are ‘stuck in the muck’. Sometimes we have no choice but to adapt, but sometimes it is time to get ‘unstuck’.

Wishing you motivation and support when it is time!