Unplugged at the Beach

I was laying on a blue lawn chair, sipping a pina-colada, enjoying my view of the ocean, when I overheard 2 guys talking behind me.

They were discussing what a perfect Saturday morning it was - sun out, hardly a cloud in the sky, 80+ degrees, and a cool breeze blowing. I smiled and silently agreed with them. "Man if only we had wifi." Their words stung like a slap on a sun-burned back.

Here we were, on a private island in the Bahamas: turquoise blue water, white sand, shady palm trees, and a floating tiki bar less than 50 yards away. "Why would anyone want to be distracted by the Internet right now?" I thought.

Of all the activities to do - Jet skis. Waterslides. Volleyball. Kayaking. Floating tiki bar (ahem). And these folks need the Internet.

Even when we're on vacation, supposed to be unplugged, recharging...we still have this need/desire to "check-in" and connect with others.

And then I realized I was guilty of this feeling too - the first thing I thought when we saw baby sharks swimming near the shore was "Ahhh I need to snapchat this."

(Ok, the first thought was "oh shit are you serious? I'm definitely not swimming in this water. Baby sharks = mama shark. Mama shark = pissed off and hungry. Pissed off and hungry = Stevie gets eaten).

As I sat under the palm tree I couldn't help but think how ridiculous they sounded. And how thankful we should've been to not have Internet on the island. To not be tempted to scroll through Instagram for 30 minutes at a time, or have to check emails and sort through the mass amount of sales ads, or be interrupted by constant "pings" of group text notifications.

So instead, I confirmed my phone was on "airplane mode" then dug my toes in the sand, smelled the salt water drifting through the air, sipped the rum in my drink, and listened to peoples shrieks and excited chatter as they ran to the edge of the water with their cameras and phones to snap pictures of the nurse sharks.