A weekend offline.

Hey there!

Let me tell you a little story. A very, very stupid story. Get ready for a lot of cringing. 

Once upon a time, also known as last Thursday, a girl named Renée was at school. This Thursday wasn't just any day. No, it was a day filled with lectures, a lot of free periods and a boring class which lasted until 5:30 pm. Our story starts in the early afternoon.

The girl named Renée was sat in the library, together with the other kids (read: childish adults) of her class. They had been there for the last two hours watching anime or normal TV-shows, talking and just blatantly not studying. In these two hours Renée got back into one of her anime phases, whilst enjoying the strawberry yoghurt. However one of her satanic classmates decided to film Renée's yoghurt-anime-sessions and sent it to the class's group chat. Let's say Renée ignored this classmate for the rest of the week. 

When the four hours long free period finally came to an end, the class got up from their library position and started the hellish climb to the third floor. Non of them particularly fond of the ridiculous amount of stairs their school holds. Before taking on the stairs Renée and another, less satanic, classmate decided to have a small toilet break. They both went into a stall when it happened. As Renée lowered her jeans she heard a loud "splash". A sudden fear took over as she turned around and without a doubt stuck her hand in the toilet to get her phone out of the toilet. Quick as she was she got the phone out and started drying it with her coat, toilet paper, even her shirt. Whatever it took to get most of the directly visible water off the phone. All whilst standing in her underwear, with a full bladder and a confused classmate in the stall next to her. 

Still panicking she went for a pee and reunited with her classmate to tell her the story. Let's say that, even though the other classmate understood her panic, she still couldn't help but laugh. This wasn't even the first time Renée had dropped her phone in the toilet, no my friends, this was the bloody second time it happened. 

Once Renée returned home later that evening, she rushed to find a bowl and rice to put her phone in. For the weekend Renée had to survive without her phone. A weekend without the endless scrolling through social media and pointless talking to friends. The first day was pretty difficult as she kept reaching for a phone covered in rice, a phone she couldn't use. The other days went by pretty easily. It gave her a weird sense of peace, not having to constantly look at a phone, to have the rectangular screen printed in your mind. It was a good weekend, a peaceful weekend. Renée found that she didn't need to be online 100% of the time, she found out that it's actually really nice to spend some time offline, to not have to check social media or worry about missing some important messages. She found that when people really needed her they would find another way to reach her. 

After the weekend she took her phone out of the rice and started it again. Thankfully the phone did work and Renée came back online. A lot of messages were left on her social media and she didn't even bother to read them all. She announced her return and the important questions or announcements were repeated and the not important things forgotten. Now she's back online which might be her happily ever after, but maybe her happily ever after is realising she isn't so dependent on her social media activity or her phone altogether. Sometimes she just needs to take a break, to clear her mind and to get that stupid rectangular shape out of her mind. 

So yes, you could say Renée lived happily ever after. She even has a little protip for all you people out there. "Whenever you go to the loo, check your back-pockets, get your phone or other technological devices out, believe me it makes having a pee a lot less stressful".