Smart Watches

If you know me, you know that there’s a grumpy old man inside of me that occasionally shows himself through the thin social veneer I’ve constructed. Despite working in tech and implementing many and various automations in my home, I find that my take on certain pieces of technology is that of my “dairy-farmer-from-North-Dakota” grandfather. Namely: the general sense of “I don’t need that nonsense.”

I say that to say this: I don’t like smart watches.

I don’t mean to say that I hate the technology inherently. But the way they are used, which is mostly just a variation on how notifications work on most people’s phones, drives me mad. But more than that, it’s the fact that most people are pretending that these smart watches are somehow less intrusive, and therefor better than phones, when they are, in fact, not.

When I’m talking to you, and you look at your phone, I think it’s rude. I’m not saying I don’t do that - I do. Just like sometimes I look at my watch to see what time it is, and often that’s an unspoken social cue for “I’m tired of listening” (subconscious or not). These tendencies I would consider negative personality aspects, and I work hard to be cognitive of them and change them.

When I’m talking to you and you look at your smart watch, it’s the same thing. I know you think that you’re being sneaky. That somehow looking at the smart watch is less intrusive than looking at your phone. “I can tell more easily if it’s something I can ignore or not,” you say.

Here’s a secret: you can ignore it. You don’t need to look at it to know that. You’re with a human being engaged in a conversation - there is very little that is worthy of interruption.

“But someone important might be calling me.” Then they can leave a voicemail.

“But this text might be important.” Then you can address it when I’m done talking to you in like 5 minutes.

Exceptions exist, of course - if you’re waiting on a call about a family member in the hospital, if you’re expecting a text from your kid to say they got home safe, these are acceptable interruptions I understand them.

But your social media notifications aren’t worth it. And you might THINK that it didn’t impact your attention all that much, but I can tell you, from the receiving end: it did. Your focus was drawn away, for longer than you think, and I feel like I am imposing on your precious time.

And perhaps I am. Perhaps you don’t want to hear what I have to say. I’ll pick up on that, and I’ll stop talking. I’ll let you be on your merry way. That’s fine. These are social cues that have existed forever, and I can read them because I tend to be extra sensitive to these things. But if you actually want to be in a conversation with me, I’d prefer if you weren’t constantly checking your wrist for every and all notifications you get.

Honestly, now that I’m writing this out, I don’t think the interruption itself is what bugs me so much as the pretense that the interruption isn’t there. Many times, I have had to write something down in conversation so I don’t forget later, or check something. When that happens, I try very hard to acknowledge the rudeness of my attention leaving the conversation, apologize, and bring my attention back. But I’m not under the impression I’m being sneaky about it. That makes it worse, in my opinion.

And I know I sound like the “old man yells at clouds” meme. And I also know that this is not really something to be mad about. But this is my blog, so it’s the perfect place for my personal hot takes and you’re just gonna have to deal with it.

So anyway. Turn off your notifications (you don’t need 90% of them anyway), leverage Do Not Disturb settings, and wear watches that just tell time. Or don’t, I’m not the boss of your life.