It’s 3:45 p.m. on a Friday and I’m sitting in the Nest scrolling through Yik Yak as I finish the last few soggy fries of my meal. There’s a few posts from students looking for “someone to just cuddle with” among other things. When I get to a yak about iPhones I get excited. It explains that iPhones are equipped with an Easter egg feature that changes all of your apps to look retro when you set your phone’s date to January 1, 1970 at 7 p.m.

Now normally I’m a skeptical person. Just like anyone else, I receive the chain emails from my grandma, warning about how thieves can break into your car by latching on to the signal from the key fob. I fact check on Snopes.com for anything that seems a little fishy and let her know that once again the misinformed users and the trolls of the Internet have lead her astray. So maybe I should have looked a little closer at the yak and thought twice about following the advice of someone who posted something anonymously, but I didn’t think that something as simple as manually scrolling back a few decades could have any lasting effects.

I take the 10 seconds to scroll back through my phones dates and suddenly out of nowhere, January 1, 1970 at 7 p.m. pops up. I count that as further proof that this is something that Apple made intentionally easy. My apps are about to look really retro. Far out.

It’s now 4 p.m. and my phone won’t turn on past the white loading screen with the black apple, but I’m sure that the retro apps are just taking a while to load. When I get back to my room I decide to try pushing in the home button and power button to restart my phone. I think about calling IT but I know their advice would be the same. “Have you tried turning it off and turning it back on again?” It works, my phone starts to reboot but after a few minutes of staring at the white screen and black apple I realize the fix might be a little more difficult.

I try plugging my phone in to my computer but iTunes can’t seem to recognize it. My phone gets very hot but never turns off. I call Apple using my roommate’s phone and I am put in touch with Adam at Apple. He laughs a little as I explain my dilemma because Apple has been dealing with this issue all day. He assures me that it isn’t my fault but after a half-hour of failed attempts at turning my phone on, it’s starting to feel like no matter whose fault it is, I’m the one who is going to be punished. He warns me that this might be a mistake that I will literally have to pay for. The battery finally dies and my phone goes black.

Adam sets up an appointment at the Polaris Apple store in Columbus for the next day at 3:30 p.m. I look at my phone, ready to put the appointment into my calendar, and realize I’m going to be phoneless for a very uncomfortable 24 hours at the least. I need to let my parents know that I am without my phone so they don’t get worried if they try to text or call. I also have to let my friends know that I’m not injured or ignoring them, that I’m just another idiot who fell for an Internet scam. I don’t know anyone’s number. Looks like Facebook messenger will have to do.

It’s now 7 p.m. My roommate and I decide to go to Mansfield to go shopping and get dinner. On the way there I realize that I have no idea how much money I have in my bank account. Normally, my phone serves as my own personal banking assistant. I can just open up my banking app and transfer money from savings to checking on the fly. Hopefully I don’t bankrupt myself.

At dinner, my roommate excuses herself to go to the bathroom. The person sitting alone in the booth behind me is directly in my line of sight. I begin to reach for my phone to avoid eye contact but then realize it isn’t there. It’s back in 1970 and can’t be reached. I’m starting to feel as if some people really do just want to see the world burn.

It’s midnight on a Saturday and I’m feeling really bad for myself. In the safe haven of Ashland University’s terrific and ever-working Wi-Fi, I have gone online to find several depressing articles all entitled with something along the lines of “Want to destroy your iPhone forever?” You. Have. Got. To. Be. Kidding. Me.

As I get ready for bed, I realize I will not be able to set my alarm on my phone tonight. HOW WILL I WAKE UP? I know there was a way I used to wake up before my phone but it takes me a few seconds of deep thought to I realize I have an alarm clock. I’ve never used the alarm on my clock. Up till now I have only used it for the Bluetooth speakers which allow me to play music without ever putting my phone down and for tricking myself into being on time by setting the clock forward 10 minutes. I’m always late.

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! What in God’s name is that sound? Oh right, it’s my alarm clock and I realize that now to hit snooze I have to actually walk over to it. This predicament almost stops me from hitting snooze. I almost actually woke up on time. Yuck.

It’s 11:30 a.m. on Saturday and I’ve got lunch plans. As I’m getting ready, I find my phone, which is dead on my desk, and push the home button expecting it to spring to life. Do I even need to check anything right now? How many times a day do I check my phone for no reason? As I am deciding what to wear I reach for my phone again. Yup still dead. I guess I’ll just have to look outside to determine what the weather is like. Spoiler alert, it’s cold.

As I’m walking to meet up with the people I’m getting lunch with, I realize I am probably late, though I have no sense of what time it is. I have no way of letting them know that I am on my way so I just walk faster. Maybe this is why people used to be more punctual. Dang that would make a good tweet. Too bad.

It’s now 1:45 p.m. on Saturday and I start my trip to Columbus. I’m nervous that I will be making the drive for nothing, but after an hour and 15-minute trip, a parking lot battle with all of the shoppers out for last minute Valentine’s gifts, and 15 minutes sitting at the genius bar, my phone is returned back good as new. Well, the battery is at one percent, and I have an endless flood of text messages, emails, Snapchats, and other notifications pouring in, but overall it works. All the geniuses at Apple had to do was take the battery out for a few minutes and turn my phone back on. Luckily, I don’t have to pay. Easy, except that I spent 24 hours without a phone and used up most of my Saturday and all of my gas.

It’s now 5 p.m. on Tuesday and I’m still trying to find the lesson in this. You can’t trust what you read on the Internet? Some people are just jerks? These are all things I knew already. The biggest thing those 24 hours showed me, was how many times a day I use my phone. I didn’t realize how long I spent looking at it in the morning or that it enabled me to oversleep so much. I didn’t think about the fact that instead of looking at other humans, I look at my phone. January 1, 1970 will not be the best day of my life, but it opened my eyes to how easy my life is because of my phone, and to how much harder my life is because of my phone.