Think you’re in control of your life? Think again

By Shaun Tumpane

Laguna Woods Globe columnist

I’m trying to pinpoint the exact moment I lost all control of my life and to whom. I have many moments from which to choose, but determining the correct one isn’t as easy as it seems.

There are those who believe they are still in control of their lives. Yeah, right! That always gets a mirthful chuckle out of us grizzled old geezers.

When confronted with this thought-provoking question, many men almost immediately reply, “When I got married.”

Now before y’all burn your bras and manziers in protest (and don’t kid yourself – if you’re a guy and you can opt in for Medicare, and you’re carrying several extra pounds, you could use a manzier), consider that this isn’t an indictment of marriage but rather concluding that marriage is a means to return to the safe, warm hearth and home environment that little boys, once all grown up, at least subliminally tend to search out as the “formula for happiness.”

While I can’t precisely discern when I lost control, I certainly know to whom. The correct answer for anyone living in what we like to call “Western civilization” is none other than the smartphone.

I think I had the last device that could be accurately referred to as a phone, a 1990s Captain Kirk flip phone: You could talk or text.

Text? Remember when you heard the word “text,” it was always immediately followed by the word “book”? Had Boomers overseen naming stuff when all this amazing technology made the scene, “text” would have been “send note,” an apt descriptive term harking back to yesteryear when we all sent notes in class.

The smartphones of 2024 can do almost anything. You can use it as a telephone, a calculator, a retail store of any kind, an accountant, a bank branch, an electronic divining rod able to find anything on the planet (including water), a way to meet girls – real and imaginary, a movie theater complete with popcorn, Twizzlers and a Slurpy delivered to your man cave, a control panel for your furnace or air conditioner, the means to start your car, turn off your home security system so that your housekeeper can access the house you just vacuumed, and my personal favorite, turning your hearing aids on or off.

Smartphones are the ultimate in labor-saving devices. However, they are spies.

I recently mused aloud that I needed to go to Home Depot. Some 13 minutes later, I received an email about Home Depot having a sale. I uttered “croissant” once, and now my phone’s a Michelin Guide.

My smartphone reminds me of my anniversary. Not odd, except I never told my phone when my anniversary was.

I replaced the tires on my car, but only after my car and my phone instructed me to do so and where.

Yeah, I’m still in control. Sure.

Shaun Tumpane is a Laguna Woods Village resident.