The Road to Repair

My mobile phone has fallen down so many times over the past three years; I was careless sometimes, people around me were careless on few occasions and at other times it was nobody’s fault. But it ended up with a few bruises anyway, both visible and invisible. There are a few dents at the corners for instance, and the screen guard, already replaced once, is now again scarred enough to be noticeable; but the more serious damages are of course lying invisible within.
I’ve been noticing that the battery drains too quickly nowadays, and since the last fall a few days ago, the phone has been heating up too much. The power button refuses to work most of the time; switching off the phone is difficult enough, what I’m more worried about is turning it on again that I’ve arranged an automatic power-on time everyday (just safety measures:)! The keyboard malfunction though, is what irritates me the most; at times it’s too slow to respond, and does the exact opposite of what I want it to do.
One phenomenon I don’t understand at all is that though I transfer important files elsewhere and clear the memory every week, the notification kept telling me there’s not enough space, and that ‘some system functions may not work’. It took a system reset to set that problem right (reset required that power button, which miraculously worked well that one time!) and that too I did at the risk of losing some data I had dearly held on to for months and years. Some very important ones, I moved to a secure storage, but when the data seemed too much to keep transferring, I let go of some dear write-ups (it now seems okay though; seems like those info were indeed meant to be gone).

Inspite of all of these shortcomings, my phone serves its purpose really well. Calls are as smooth as ever (though none except Vodafone/Idea has called me recently), texting is not an issue as long as I’m ready to go at the keyboard’s pace. The battery stays ever faithful if I’m considerate enough to give it breaks in between, and the overheating cools down quickly if I’m friendly enough to give it a little attention and care. It has never ever left me stranded in the middle of nowhere, being even extra faithful to the point of going to sleep at 4% and waking up at 5%!
I realise though, if I’m not extra careful with this guy on the way forward, he may be lost beyond any expert’s expertise, and I may lose him altogether.

I look back at myself over the past years, and realise that I’m no different. There has been so many falls; from the carelessness of caretakers, from the ignorance of some actors who came and went, and sometimes from nobody’s fault (let’s call it fate). Whatever the reason, a fall is a fall, and I ended up with bruises. Some healed with time, but a few left scars behind. The more serious injuries though are within, quite invisible yet posing a threat to the daily functioning.
The battery does drain quickly now, the energy drops too drastically- both physical and intellectual- that I’m forced to take too many breaks in between, to recharge and get going again. The machine gets heated up too quickly, usually when I ask for too much in so little time, and it does require great love and care and understanding to cool it back down again. Falling asleep is a really hard affair, waking up is even more difficult, that it’s safe to have a backup alarm, even if it is your parents yelling at you at the top of their voices.
The most irritating part is of course, the fact that your brain doesn’t work fast enough; too much of work, too little time, but you realise you have to be patient with it — give it enough breaks in between, wait till it processes each information bit by bit, even if it takes double the usual time. And yes, no matter how much data you try to delete or write down or talk out, the system keeps telling you that it cannot take in any more, that if you insist on going forward without a thorough clean-up, ‘some system functions may not work’. The system is indeed asking for a reset, but there’s too much valuable information in here to simply push the reset button. Guess I’ll have to transfer the very valuable ones and let go of some others, which best be deleted anyway.

The wonderful part is that, inspite of all these damages to the system, I am proud of the way I keep going. Conversations, though they don’t come as freely as before, are not entirely absent. Both outgoing and incoming calls are restricted to a very stingy handful, but they do happen once in a while. And the works do get done, if I’m willing to take breaks and cool my fuming brain; well, though the patience required with myself gets on my nerve sometimes, it does pay off.
My brain, heart or mind, or whatever it’s that’s keeping me up and going, it hasn’t let me down till date. It’s extra faithful when it comes to delivering results, though it costs the battery much. And yes, it has gone to sleep at 5% and woke up at 10% many a day, only because it had no choice; and I’m, at the same time, grateful and sorry.
I do know that there’s a limit to the damages it can handle, and future falls will place me in even more danger of losing myself altogether.

But the good news is, repair is not out of question. Though this Redmi design doesn’t allow me to open the phone and set things right on my own, I know that I can take it to a skilled technician, all the more better if it’s the company technician who knows it inside out, or even better if you know the maker.

©mar:ter
25 April 2020

The Creator doesn’t directly intervene always, but he has heralds everywhere, whom we are supposed to reach out to in times of need