through the broken glass
a thin film holds the shards together
the other night, i dropped my iPhone 4 flat onto the asphalt of buendia. i very calmly picked it up without even uttering a cursory expletive and found that its liquid crystal display's glass face had been smashed. a capillary of cracks took root at two corners and grew diagonally across the screen. i may have whispered damn! but my first thought at the time was how long it would take to have the glass replaced. i had seen this kind of damage before and i knew it could be fixed, so i replied to my friend whose SMS was the proximate cause of the action to reach into my side pocket while one hand held an umbrella and the other was rendered less mobile by a laptop wedged under an armpit. it still worked. the screen protector from capdase kept the glass from falling off the phone, and the shattered glass could actually pass off as some kind of design.
despite the damage, it still works
that i was extremely relaxed despite the possibly costly repair my phone needs to undergo does not surprise me. i neither cry nor blow my top over incidents of analogous nature, particularly when i am at fault. what's done cannot be undone, and there are no rewinds in real time, so knocking myself on the head for being stupid or careless is fruitless. it won't fix my iPhone, nor will it make me feel any less worse. i just remind myself that i should take better care next time.
a deep dimple on my iPhone 1, which i dropped countless times on solid surfaces -- and it still works
i gamely showed the damage to my iPhone to my friends, not to draw random if not insincere sympathy, but to parry underserved blame. a friend declared that if i had a bumper or some kind of case, the extent of the damage could have been hugely reduced, and i would have been spared both the hassle and the cost of having it repaired. i've been an iPhone owner since the first generation unit rolled out n 2007, and i've never considered getting protection for the reason that i didn't want it to become unnecessarily bulky. the iPhone's sleek, minimalist design is what attracts me most to it (well, it does help that it's emblazoned with the apple logo), so even the thinnest of armors can be hardly considered as being barely there. i wanted a sportscar, not a tank.
my camera was assaulted with water at the songkhran festival in chiang mai -- and i still stayed outdoors
besides, i'm not particularly obsessive about keeping any of my things -- whether gadgets or equipment -- in their original pristine state. i've always believed that my enjoyment and use of objects of value should not be unduly curtailed by the degree of care i exert to exhaust their usefulness. i have no interest in selling any of my stuff at some future time at the moment that i purchase them because i am uncertain whether i would in fact upgrade, or eventually find them useless. this is not a euphemism for carelessness, but a form of carpé diem. anyone who is paranoid about possibly damaging an expensive piece of equipment might as well not invest in one.
foul weather is a gift, even for photography
it is no different from avoiding crowded places for fear of a stampede, or refusing to visit a beautiful country because of a misguided travel advisory, or declining to eat exotic food for fear of getting diarrhea. it often results in a missed opportunity, a potentially interesting experience lost to caution. i would rather risk some damage to my camera if it would mean taking a particularly beautiful picture. many of the amazing images on this blog is precisely a result of this measured risk-taking.
take the plunge -- you won't regret it
so everything that i have ever owned has not survived unscathed, but that they have survived despite exposure to countless dangers reflects the extent and quality of their use. the battle scars are varied: dents, scratches, rusting screws and hinges, microscopic cracks. in none of these instances did i unnecessarily punish myself for my stupidity and carelessness. seldom did i utter a cursory expletive.
i would not have managed to take this iconic shot of the condura skyway run if i didn't make a calculated risk
i do not regret the manner that i use my gadgets, nor the degree of care that i have exerted to ensure their long life. their condition -- their unpristine state -- is an indication that they have been maximized, that they have exhausted their purpose, and that i have lived my life unfettered by excessive precaution.