Against iPods
I usually take a firm stance in the “gray area” of things, which is a much firmer stance than most people realize. To be truly wishy-washy in a rigid world requires dedication: the pressure from a dichotomous society to be “for” or “against” things has led to many a case of mid-level insanity. So, please note that “against iPods” is not my official position, but merely the title of the post.I fell into owning (“owning”) an iPod. I never searched one out. If anything, I was opposed to the idea if only because I was too lazy to try and figure out a new form of technology, and stuck stubbornly to my Discman, which was itself a long-time-coming replacement for my Walkman. Give me a break, okay? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, and I suppose my definition of “ain’t broke” is different from the rest of the world, who considers having to flip over tapes or lug around CDs to be “less than perfect.” Well, whatever to you. To each their own.
When I started dating a “gadget freak,” iPods and other such technology became significantly more visible in my life, even as my interest in them remained roughly the same. One fateful day, I was loaned an iPod. Even though it was filled primarily with bands I wasn’t familiar with, I relished the time during which I had it. I realize now that most of my enjoyment was from a semi-forced exposure to new music. (I am very much in a music rut, as with books and films, I need someone to really push me into new artistic areas, or I just won’t go there, preferring instead to hear the same Elvis Costello record AGAIN before it gets a little too repetitive, so I put in a DIFFERENT Elvis Costello record.)
I was riding BART that day, which I already find to be a very relaxing experience. I know most would disagree, but I maintain that being on BART, or most moving vehicles, is akin to being in the womb, for me. The screeching tracks and the chattering teenagers, more often than not, have very little effect on my sense of calm. Adding music to this experience was a psychological orgasm. The normal meditation I experienced on public transit had become a completely enveloping zen.
The ex-boyfriend later purchased me an iPod shuffle, which I treasured. I liked how much smaller it was than a CD player, I liked that the constant shuffle kept me in suspense over what would play next. I felt so fucking awesome strutting around to “Money for Nothing” with a lightweight silver square clipped to my lapel. I was the star of my own music video, and the people around me were merely props, actors, shadows in a world that belonged entirely to me. I felt a great sense of control over my existence. Further into the relationship, the ex upgraded his iPod to, I don’t know, whatever the next level of iPod was at the time, and I received what was then considered to be a Mac antique. Clunky and with very little storage space (in comparison to what the next model had, I assume), I still loved this thing to the bone (to the microchip?). To the boy’s credit, he let me keep it as a gift, even after a thorough breakup and a number of arguments. Many an asshole would have demanded the iPod back, or would have merely “lent” it to me in the first place.
I kept on keeping on with the iProut, as I named it, listening to it on the bus almost everyday, using it to block out noise in the pizza parlor when I wanted to read during my lunch break, and so on. If I left the house without it, I felt a vague sort of panic, an impending sense of inescapable boredom, as though without this little white and silver box, I wouldn’t be able to control my own outlook on the world - the bus and its noises would control me, and not the other way around.
At some point, the iPod started acting wonky. It would randomly pause songs even when the touchpad was “locked.” This became a huge nuisance, and I “reset” the iPod, hoping to fix the problem. It did not work. I surprised myself with how little I cared about trying to repair it. I didn’t look up any Mac forums online, I didn’t really ask anyone what to do. I put up with the glitch for awhile before deciding to just abandon the thing altogether. I reverted back to using my Shuffle, but some of the magic was gone. It was still a working machine, but it didn’t seem worth the trouble. I would enjoy the experience of leaving my house early in the morning, feeling a cool blast of air hit me in the face at the same time Warren Zevon or someone would begin serenading me, but a few songs into the rotation I’d become frustrated and impatient, flipping through songs constantly, trying to find music to best match my mood.
I can’t say exactly when, but at one point I stopped bringing the Shuffle anywhere with me. I just left it at home. Once or twice, on particularly upsetting days, especially right after my most recent breakup, I would load it up with Mason Jennings and Fleetwood Mac and The Pernice Brothers, and just let myself have one of these musically masochistic moods. Not because the music choices were bad, obviously, but because they stirred up such bad emotions in me: longing, confusion, melancholy. A general psychological aching, completely self-induced, all at the hand of transportable music.
On Saturday, I attempted to load up my Shuffle once again. This time I was in a positive, flirtatious mood, and I wanted to carry around some downhome music, some Allman Brothers, Morphine, Creedence Clearwater Revival type stuff. In the middle up uploading the songs, I was told my Shuffle didn’t successfully sync up with my laptop. I got a series of malfunction pop-ups, did what I could to disperse them, and then disconnected the Shuffle. It wouldn’t play, nor would my computer recognize it when I tried to plug it back in. I tried a few things, but underneath it all was my true voice, which said to me, “Eh, whatever.” I put the Shuffle in my desk drawer, and left the house, committed to maintaining my upbeat mood regardless of the fact that I wouldn’t have some bluesy song about cold-hearted but irresistable women blasting into my ears.
So, it’s officially over. My love affair with not only iPods, but headphones in public, is entirely over. It’s very strange. I am not deciding this because I am too lazy to repair these machines - I still have every intention of researching their problems and doing what I can to fix them, when I have a chance. But to realize that my world has not stopped without them is the sign the affair is over.
For weeks now, I’ve been listening to the actual sounds of my city. Old women and teenage boys gabbing on the bus. Cars zooming by at night, rough on the pavement like rolling thunder that explodes into the sound of waves crashing onto the beach as they pass me and the Doppler effect kicks in. Ambulances off in the distance, the decompression of the bus when it leans down to scoop up a man with a cane or a bum with a cart full of god-knows-what. Windows rattling in their frames, dogs barking, men laughing, hipsters complaining, brakes screeching, birds singing, trees rustling, wind whipping around corners and open doors. Car doors opening and closing, washing machines alternating their cycles from slushy slumping rotations to devilishly high-pitching spinning. The crowded restaurants whose hums seep across the street, and so on. Cash registers and crumpling paper and pouring rain. The horrible noise the underground MUNI makes when someone is blocking its doors.
Not all of these noises are pleasant, and not all of them are interesting, but they belong to the world I am part of. They are a reality I share with the majority of the people around me. We react to the same stimuli - otherwise strangers, we are connected in that brief moment of eye contact after we turn our heads in the same direction, following the sounds of boisterous laughing or screeching brakes. The slightest tilt of the head or raise of the eyebrows might not mean anything more direct than “That is annoying,” or “That sounds bad,” but enough of those tiny movements over the course of several weeks has come to mean significantly more than that to me. It means I am participating in the world with these people. This is my sidewalk, my bus, my laundromat, my restaurant, my neighborhood, my city, and I share it with them. I feel so much more connected to San Francisco, and to myself, now that I am not molding my commute with sounds that are necessarily disconnected from my immediate surroundings.
I still listen to music in the office, and in my home. I yearn for both calming and frenetic sounds as background noise to work and play. But those sounds are exactly that: the background. They supplement and inform the experience I am already having, be it eating dinner, typing up reports, cleaning my room, having a conversation, or making love. But at no point do they replace those experiences. They are not substitutes for an imperfect reality, or a reaction to boredom - and when they are, I can sense their dishonesty immediately. The music will not work, it will not be enjoyable. It will become as aggravating to me as the sounds of buses and traffic were to me when I became enamored with the iPod.
I don’t know where the switch came from, I don’t know when it flipped. I can’t say that I will never want an iPod again - even this weekend I had wanted one. But it’s become liberating for me to realize that, in many cases, not only do I not need a self-created bubble of sound and psychology to get through the day, but I enjoy not having one. Despite all the annoyances and irritations, I more often feel comfortable creating peace for myself amongst the chaos of the city than trying to assemble a good mood from a lot of arbitrary sounds and words.
And it’s things like that that make me wonder if I’m not, maybe, slightly, a little bit insane.
I hope I didn’t sound preachy, by the way - y’all relish the use of your iPods for your own reasons, and that’s cool, I would never begrudge you that (except in jest, obviously). I’m just remarking on a change I’ve noticed in myself, and wondering if it strikes a chord with anyone else.
