Cell phones - A Stress Factor? By: Emily Rosenqvist In this world of stress, where our lives are made up of schedules with expectations and overlapping appointments, do we really need another thing to add to the list of stress-causing factors? I’m talking about the cell phone, that little item that is in nearly everybody’s pocket or pocketbook. During the past five years, the cell phone industry has exploded, constantly bringing us newer, better, cooler versions of the wonderful phone that offers us a total time of zero minutes a day when we can’t be reached. This means that there is no time when you are allowed to feel unsociable, when you can take a walk on your own to just clear your mind. The days are over when you could blame traffic for not getting home in time to call the list of people you promised because what better time to call somebody than when stuck in your car for an extra hour with nothing to do. Don’t get my mobile-phone pessimism wrong; the truth is that I’m probably the biggest cell fan ever. I wasn’t sure if I’d survive leaving my darling Nokia in Sweden when I left a few months ago, being forced to depend on old-fashioned wall attached(or in the best case wireless) phones for a year. What if a friend needs to reach me in the middle of the night? Or if I’m out walking the dog and I miss a call from someone very important? I was pretty addicted to my phone; it followed me from my room to the kitchen to the living room. Like I would ever leave it unsupervised, I could miss a phone call! It was a hard thing to do, saying goodbye to my best friend (in the sense that it kept me in touch with all my friends) but I did it. Having been without my cell for a couple of months, I can now relax even when I’m not within reach of a phone. I actually feel comfortable knowing that whoever decides they want to talk to me after 10:30 p.m. will have to wait until morning. Besides, I trusted my mom in Sweden with the huge responsibility of looking after my cell while I’m gone, passing on any important messages that come in for me. Now, to those of you who have the great but stressful opportunity of being reached at all times, I’m not going to advice you to get rid of your cell (because trust me when I say that it’s a hard thing to do!). But if you at some point don’t feel like talking to anyone, simply press the off-button and enjoy the feeling of being absolutely unreachable. If after a while you start feeling socially abandoned, just turn it on again. You will at least have realized that you can survive, and the world does not go under without your constant availability.