I wakened groggy within the Austin airport, my head aching from the place I would pillowed it on my lumpy backpack. My purse was near me, our boarding passes for my household’s 5 a.m. departure tucked protectively in a single aspect. Then one panicked thought jolted into my head: WHERE WAS MY PHONE?
Let’s backtrack: My husband, teen daughter and I had been flying from Seattle to Cleveland for the April 8 whole photo voltaic eclipse. By way of a bizarre tangle of occasions, we missed our departing flight. The one new flight we might nab left us caught from midnight to five a.m., sleeping on the airport flooring in Texas’ capital metropolis.
Should you’ve ever deliberate a long-awaited journey for your loved ones and watched it begin to go mistaken, you realize my thoughts was pinging like a ball in a pinball machine. There have been one million threads I used to be making an attempt to weave collectively to save lots of this spring break journey.
And since it is 2024, 999,999 of these threads required use of my iPhone. From rebooking the flight to alerting our resort that we might be late to finding our baggage, I used to be always tapping and calling on my trusty telephone display.
However I would dozed off for two or 3 hours on the chilly flooring of Austin-Bergstrom Worldwide Airport, and one way or the other once I woke, that telephone was not in my hand, pocket or purse. Had I left it someplace in our sleepy late-night trek by the airport? Was it perched on a toilet sink or sitting on high of a merchandising machine? Or worse, had some early-morning traveler noticed it whereas I slept and made off with it?
Then I remembered: I used to be sporting my Apple Watch. Though the battery was ticking worryingly low, it nonetheless had energy. I pressed the aspect button below the digital crown. It introduced up a display of icons, together with one exhibiting a ringing smartphone. One press and I heard probably the most pleasant sound my ears might hear, a sweetly persistent BING BING BING.
Apple Watch comes with a function that can beep a misplaced iPhone, and I would by no means wanted it extra.
It turned out that my telephone had merely slipped down between two suitcases. I tracked the beeping, discovered it instantly and began to breathe once more.
Learn extra: Utilizing an Apple Watch Remodeled My Relationship With Self-Care
I did not even need an Apple Watch
I by no means wished a smartwatch. I cherished the straightforward fashion of my Movado Museum traditional watch, with its elegant black-and-gold shade scheme and minimalist design. However my husband, the techie, gave me an Apple Watch Sequence 7 for my birthday again in 2021. He raved about options like health capabilities, and the flexibility to set timers. Positive, OK, I will attempt it, I assumed.
Now, I am hooked.
I take advantage of the maps app to seek out my option to appointments. I take advantage of the exercise app to trace every thing from brief walks to the submit workplace to lengthy biking exercises. I take advantage of the climate program to examine the forecast and temperature. I take advantage of the built-in timer once I want a reminder to slip a loaf of recent bread out of the oven. I take advantage of the tap-to-pay Apple Pay choice at our native drive-in burger joint.
However I do not suppose any function on the watch – together with telling time – has made me as grateful because the find-your-phone choice.
After all, there are different smartwatches on the market, together with Google’s Pixel Watch. You might discover a kind of different choices extra to your liking. I occur to be tucked into the Apple ecosystem, and I am OK with that.
Face it: We want our telephones, even for celestial occasions
I do not lose my iPhone that always. It is often shut by, in my pocket or purse. However once I get that sinking feeling that I left it someplace, I am eternally grateful that one contact on my wrist could make it beep – so long as it is shut sufficient to me.
I’ve used different methods to seek out my misplaced telephone, after all. I’ve requested my daughter or associates to easily name it to make it ring. I’ve beeped it from the Discover My choice on my husband’s telephone. However the easiest and quickest means is to only press the button on my watch.
Our eclipse journey turned out to be value all the trouble. The Cleveland skies brightened simply in time, and we watched the eclipse from outdoors the Rock and Roll Corridor of Fame. The museum performed Pink Floyd’s Darkish Facet of the Moon because the solar slipped away, then flowed into Invoice Withers’ achingly unhappy Ain’t No Sunshine throughout the 4 minutes of totality, earlier than triumphantly blasting The Beatles’ Right here Comes The Solar as sunshine returned.
When the solar slid behind the moon, the temperature dropped about 10 levels immediately, and the individuals round us erupted within the purest expression of pleasure, kissing and dancing and snapping photographs. It made recollections my household will always remember. And these days, with a lot driving on staying linked, I am grateful I did not have so as to add a misplaced telephone to my record of mini-disasters.