A Week By the Sea Sans Smartphone

My holiday from the internet

Last month my husband and I were lucky enough to take a week away from everything.¹ We packed up our car and headed out towards one of my favourite places on earth and definitely my favourite place in the UK: Cornwall, the tip of the shoe on the map, where there are cliff walks and beaches and fresh fish and chips and an actual spot called “Land’s End.” We had, appropriately for this substack, a week by the sea.

The view from our window

I had decided to enjoy this week without my phone. I’d been reading a lot about other people’s experiences without internet/ tech and remembered what a nice time I’d had 5 years earlier, spending several days away at Christmas on a disconnected retreat reading Cal Newport’s Digital Minimalism. Why not try it again?

The “Rules”

A five hour drive in growing darkness with 50mph winds and gusting rain meant that I kept my phone on for navigation and an audiobook/ podcasts on our way there. Once we arrived, I kept it on airplane mode all week so that I could enjoy my audiobook and use the alarm clock/ timer/ flashlight.

I had texted my friends to let them know that I wouldn’t be available, but that they could contact my husband if needed. 

As the week unfolded, I avoided the laptop (even Word for writing) and asked my husband to pick up a spiral notebook when he went out to the shops. Most afternoons I found myself writing in it while I gazed out over the harbor, the tide rolling in. I jotted down observations about the dogs and the people and the boats anchored there. A few evenings, we watched old-fashioned TV, commercials and all. 

We discovered a retro shop that sold everything from old records and lace doilies to silver spoons and used books, where I picked up a few interesting titles, and a tiny new bookshop on the highstreet, about 12 square feet, crammed with all the titles you could ever want, where I was treated to a murder mystery of my choice. I had also brought my e-reader and allowed myself to benefit from being able to read in bed at night without keeping the lights on.

It wasn’t quite like life in the ‘90s, but it was close, for me. And of course, I loved it. The universal response I got from my friends was, “I’m so happy for you!” or “I’m so jealous!”

The Privilege

I felt really privileged to have a week without my phone, and that’s actually the first thing I noticed: that it was a privilege. I couldn’t have done this experiment unless my husband had been willing to keep his phone on. The apartment we rented had no landline, and we have too many people in our lives in varying degrees of medical/other situations for us to be completely unreachable. 

What’s more, there were occasions when we needed to make a reservation or check opening hours or engage in some other form of contact with the outside world, and this simply wasn’t possible without the internet. I was privileged to benefit from modern tech without actually having to engage with it myself.

I use that word, “privileged” (fraught though it may be) on purpose. Being able to step away from a phone or internet usually means being able to step away from people - both the needs they have and the safety they provide. 

In chatting with a single friend about my experiment, she said that for all the talk about leaving phones behind to go for a walk, she simply wouldn’t feel comfortable doing so where she lives. I’ve lived in situations like that too - places where I didn’t feel safe (for whatever reason) being unable to contact someone else for help. Does that contact always have to happen by phone? No, but sometimes it’s just the way things are.

Our little holiday was in a safe town, full of people. I did go for a few walks by myself without my phone, but I was always within sight / shouting distance of someone, even on a mostly empty beach. 

It’s funny, isn’t it, how our perceptions change things? I grew up in a world without mobile phones and my first semester abroad involved payphones and international calling cards and the occasional 30 minutes in an internet cafe, and yet, now I feel less safe than I did then. I know there are studies saying that the world is just as safe, or safer than it was, but those studies don’t change how we feel in any given moment. I wonder, too, how much naivete played a part in my feelings then, and how much experience plays a part in my feelings now. I don’t think there are clear-cut answers.

The Pace

The next thing I noticed was that our pace of life slowed considerably. Now, of course, we were on holiday! And we are the kind of people who equate holiday-ing with resting and not sight-seeing or event-ing. Nevertheless, it felt magical to not have looming emails or messages demanding our attention. 

I let myself get bored. I let myself spend hours just people watching through rain-spattered windows. I let myself not scratch the itch for information when I wanted to know something. I thought about making a list of all the things I wanted to google when the week was over, but I figured if they were important enough, I’d remember them later. (I didn’t.)

Once, when driving on back roads between small towns, my husband’s phone lost signal. Instead of stressing out, we figured we had nowhere to be, so even if we got lost it wasn’t a big deal. Plus we could just, you know, follow the road signs.

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The Anxiety

Plenty of studies have shown a link between smartphone use and a rise in anxiety. I’ve noticed it in myself in recent years, but it’s not clean cut for me because there are other factors at play. Still, what I did notice on my holiday was this: my husband went to get us groceries with only a vague suggestion of timings, and after an hour I didn’t have the creeping worry I usually do about whether or not he had ended up in a car accident. First, because I wasn’t watching the time with my phone in the other room, and second because I wasn't expecting him to text me if he was running late. He knew my phone was off. Simply by removing the possibility of contact, I had reduced my worry. (Now, of course if he had been several hours late I would have turned my phone on to check.)

I also realized that the anxiety was mixed up in a false sense of control. Knowledge, or lack of knowledge, gives a sense of power or at least participation.² If I know what’s going on in another country, I feel involved, even if I’m not, really. That feeling can quickly become one of anxiety or guilt because if I know something, shouldn’t I be acting on that knowledge? Only, there’s not really much I can do, so I feel anxious and guilty because I know it’s not right to be motionless and yet that’s exactly what I am. (This is why I think we need to be discerning about the news we consume.) 

My phone gives me access to knowledge about all sorts of things: world events, new recipes, friend’s lives, home decor tips, colleagues’ accomplishments, the impending weather… the list goes on. But that knowledge is a weight that I felt much, much lighter without.

The Itch

Did I experience a detox? Yes, but it was surprising when. The time I most clearly found myself instinctively reaching for my phone was during TV commercials! We tend to watch shows or movies on streaming platforms and so commercials are really rare, but they definitely caused me to want something more interesting. Despite having a book nearby, what I wanted was the ease of scrolling.

I also found myself itching for some sort of simple manual task like knitting or cross-stitch. There were many moments when I wanted to sit quietly and watch the boats bobbing along and the steam train as it came round the hills on the far side of the harbor, but also do something. I had thought about bringing my colored pencils and coloring books that were all the rage a decade ago, but decided against it. Next time, I’ll definitely pack them. 

The other thing I missed was sharing my experiences with friends - sending pictures of all the beauty or snippets of funny conversation overheard. The phone is a double-edged sword, especially for those of us whose loved ones span a significant geographical distance. 

The Conclusion

I’m not sure if I really have a conclusion or resolution. Part of me would love a life without a smartphone, but too much of my work and even personal relationships rely on it as a means of communication.

We came back from our holiday straight into a house move and a week of unintentional disconnectedness, with no wifi and almost no phone signal. I was taking calls by the tiny window of the upstairs bathroom, the only place where the thick stone walls don’t interfere with whatever waves are needed to place a call. It was really difficult to get anything done, and I found that I had missed out on things online.³

Smartphone-free life isn’t in my near future, but for now I’m (mostly) happy with my use of it. I’m more inclined to walk around our village without it, to leave it in another room, and to just ignore it for hours at a time. We try to be generally unavailable by message on Sundays.

I’m in a community of people who are similarly dispassionate about their devices: we hosted Thanksgiving for 13 adults plus hordes of small children over the weekend, and I didn’t see anyone on their phones. 

I’m going to make sure I’ve got crafty options around, and I’m going to be checking my screentime reports to see how I’m doing.

And of course, I’m hoping that we can manage another phone-free week by the sea next year!

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Tell me what boundaries do you have around phone use? What has worked, practically, for you? I’m always curious to learn how other people are navigating these tricky waters.

1. For the Europeans reading, I would call it our “annual holiday” but I remember hearing that phrase when I moved here from America and thinking that everyone must be really rich to take such a thing. Seven years later I can say: they’re not. Everyone I know takes a break, even if they’re struggling on one income with a new baby. Rest is prioritized in a way that the US could really learn from.

2. We’re all marinating in a culture that accepts Bacon’s “Knowledge is Power” proposition without question.

3. Ironically, Substack is the place where conversations around tech-free or tech-light lives are happening. It’s the first social media (I know, I know, but it is) app that I’ve ever been drawn to, and I’m trying to be attentive to how it’s using me.