My iPhone 5 charger stopped working Wednesday night. The day before, I had noticed that it needed to be positioned just so, and then not touched/moved at all, in order for the lightning bolt charge symbol to come on and stay on…but then that night, no matter how I positioned it, I could not get that lightning bolt symbol to stay longer than a split second.
My heart dropped because my phone charger had also started not working properly the other day…which left me with no charger now that could charge my phone.
I also worried because what if this meant something was wrong with my phone as opposed to the chargers, since it was 2 chargers against 1 phone.
I examined my phone and felt that maybe the charger plug area was a bit dirty, an unfortunate byproduct of being transported around in a purse that I couldn’t ever seem to manage to keep organized and crumb-free for very long…so I tried swabbing it with a tissue… but still no luck. Oh why couldn’t I have been more protective of my phone, and seen it as a good reason for taking those extra 5 seconds to finish and/or throw away opened packages of my toddler’s mum mums, or my girls’ bear paws cookies?
Then I examined the cord of my charger, and realized that it wasn’t looking quite like it used to (notice the slight notch/bending near the adapter). There was a pretty good chance that this was the reason for an inconsistent connection of the charge to my phone?
This realization also made me reprimand myself for all those times (which maybe really became every time?) that I would tug my phone off of its charger cord as though the cord was invincible. I think because of it’s whiteness, and brand image(?), and what just appeared for whatever reason to me to be such a “sturdy” cord and device in comparison to other electronics I’ve owned, it just somehow never occurred to me that tugging my phone off the cord could break it…
As smartphones, for those of us who own smartphones, really become such a significant part of our lives that it isn’t a very good idea to be without it for very long at all, I realized that I had no real good choice except to take time out of my schedule on Thursday to go to the mall and visit the Apple Store. I dreaded the visit, imagining the judgment I was feeling towards myself coming at me from all the Apple Store experts who I was sure treated their things (especially their iPhones) with much better care than was evident with my device and charger cord. I also dreaded having to shell out $ for a new charger OR even worse, to find out my phone was no longer use-able as a result of my neglect/abuse. Fortunately for me, my husband is a very, very patient and understanding man who would be supportive of my plight — he does not suffer from the same pitfalls of shame and guilt and fear over such incidents, even if they’re the results of mistakes that could have been easily avoided had I just been a bit more perfect. I kept this in mind, that whatever the situation, the important thing was to just find out what needs to be done to fix it, and then to do what I need to do to fix it…and not let myself become overly stressed or emotional such that I end up “taking this out” on my kids or husband or anyone else, because that definitely would not be helpful or productive in any way. I am proud to say that in this particular scenario, I was able to maintain perspective and stay positive and focused =) — and I am also very happy to report that I actually thoroughly enjoyed my visit to the Apple store and was super impressed with their service and care not only of myself but also of another customer who had a question she apologized for as “probably a stupid question,” but for which the service rep reassured her that she’d be surprised how many people come in for just exactly her issue. It probably helped to find out that I actually had 15 days left on my one-year warranty (so thank goodness I didn’t put off fixing my problem, which I sometimes will do if I get over-stressed about something), and it turned out that it was indeed my charger cable, and my service rep also reassured me that I was not alone in experiencing problems with my cord (not sure if this is entirely true, but it was nice to hear). He promptly took my broken cord (after I shot the quick photo above) and replaced it with a nice, brand-new, still in its wrapper cord which I promised to treat with better care and respect now that I was made keenly aware that its relative resilience did not equal invincibility. All free of charge thanks to the warranty =) Grateful that I didn’t have to buy a new phone or charger cable, I happily purchased a new phone charger from the Apple Store, to ensure that this would be as guaranteed to work as could be guaranteed. My car charger that had recently also stopped working had always had a message that it may be “unreliable,” and while it did seem to work fine initially, it indeed eventually turned out to be unreliable and in a most untimely fashion while I was trying to rely on my iPhone as a GPS in my recent trip to New Jersey. Another unofficial iPhone car charger I purchased started burning when I tested it that morning (I was trying to figure out if I was going to need to buy a new one). And later that afternoon, as I was sharing about my day with a friend, I found out she had the same experiences with multiple car chargers either working okay at first and then failing, or doing the burning thing. So my take-away lessons from all this iPhone Charger stuff? It’s really important to be able to stay “plugged in” to our power source in order to stay charged up, literally for my iPhone, but also figuratively in all of life (i.e. our bodies, our hearts, our relationships…), so I’m going to “slow down” a bit in order to be more conscientious and care-ful (which I’m thinking of more and more of as trying to be more “full of care”). Just because something “appears” super sturdy, that doesn’t mean it’s invincible, because most created things on this side of Heaven are not by nature meant to be invincible…and they are not meant to be treated as though they were invincible, but are meant to require a degree of care and thoughtfulness, and gentleness… Things that are valuable and precious not only require but also deserve some degree of special treatment, of being treated as valuable and precious to us… Things that are valuable and precious are not created to survive in environments where they are taken for granted and abused, even if it’s just with little tugs that seem harmless, but which eventually add up… Practically speaking, I am taking my time now when unplugging my iPhone from its new chargers. It doesn’t actually require a whole lot of time or even effort — just a little bit each morning, each time… I also set aside a chunk of time finally to clean out my purse, and am more aware now of not putting opened leftover snacks into my purse because my iPhone (and everything else I actually intentionally keep in there) deserves a nicer, cleaner more organized environment. This also doesn’t actually require a whole lot of time or even effort — just a little bit each time there is a decision to make about something going in the garbage instead of my purse, or getting taken out of my purse and put away where it belongs each time when I get home… I am also attempting to be more thoughtful and a bit more “full of care” in how I treat my car (which I also recently cleaned out, inspired/motivated/energized by my friend who is extraordinarily and just naturally “clean” and “clutter-free”), my house (bit by bit)… and especially in how I treat my own heart, and hoping it overflows more and more positively in how I am treating people in my life, especially my children and husband.I am aware that what I do in this one week or two, while my iPhone charger incident is fresh in my mind, is not going to be good enough to really change anything, but rather it is about making a start in the right direction, becoming aware and conscientious and purposeful and intentional in re-training myself with these small habits, because they eventually will add up, one way or the other.