I rely on cell service to power my phone and my computers. Other than an electric toothbrush and a Bluetooth speaker, I have no tech gadgets. No Wi-Fi. No television. I rarely use headphones, and when I do, they have cords. It is actually an experiment of sorts… a life I have aspired to for quite some time.

I chose this.

I work to create the most nature-based life I possibly can while still technically living indoors. (Okay, some of the time. My second home is a tent.) I choose to minimize interaction with technology not because I think it’s bad, but because I prefer a more analog life. I always say I could write on parchment with a feathered quill, in calligraphy of course, if I could. Okay, not really… I have finally learned to type on a computer keyboard. But I still love writing with pen and paper and have kept a journal since I was a small child. Do you even know how many filled journals I have? I consider them my most valuable treasure and the one thing I would go back into a burning house for. (Now THAT is a daunting project for my upcoming autobiography.)

I live and teach a more old-school approach to things because I do not want the old ways to be forgotten in this highly advanced age of ultra-convenience. Living off grid for several years, growing my own food and learning to preserve it, spoke to something deep and primal within. While it was an awful lot of work… just living, that is… I now prefer to focus on a writing project. Or twelve.

And taking walks. My love, a walk in nature, beckons me every single moment I sit at my writing desk. A serious conundrum for sure.

I love my rustic mountain living, even in the extreme weather, when staying warm and self-caring is a full-time job. (Okay, most of the time. Sometimes it is truly brutal.) Simple feels right and good, and my path has continued to show me ways to get back to the basics of things.

That being said, I have been able to successfully run a business off excellent cell service and a hotspot. Until now.

In all the world of nearly continuous, miraculous technological evolution, my cell service has actually decreased by about half. I now barely have enough magical cellular juju to do all the things a modern, semi-online business requires of these devices. At first, I was annoyed and thought surely it was temporary. But then I remembered what happened twice last month. I lost ALL service for most of the day. Both times. That meant, other than my mediocre telepathy skills, I had zero ways of communicating with the outside world. Alone on a mountain with no neighbors for over two miles.

I thought that should concern me.

But it doesn’t.

I have skills. I have trained extensively in a variety of ways for a very long time. And what keeps most of the irrational fear away is an unwavering trust… in the universe and especially in myself. I spend little time fretting over things I cannot control and simply prepare. It’s my favorite Leave No Trace principle. Number one… Plan Ahead and Prepare. Whether it’s planning for a backcountry trip or living as a feral woman on top of a mountain, I know I am capable.

Now, as for the cell service provider… that’s where this story takes a turn from the philosophical to the absurd.

They announced they would compensate those who lost service with a $20 credit. Wonderful. But when you went searching for it on their app or website, there was only a vague mention of it. When I contacted their customer service… a chatbot, naturally… it gave me the most magnificently ridiculous answers to my inquiry, with nary a mention of the credit. It was incredibly frustrating and ended with me telling the clearly intentionally misdirecting AI bot that I was already searching for another provider. (This is an empty threat. They are the only ones with service here in the official middle of nowhere.) I never could get an actual human on the phone. Long gone are the days of real people helping customers in person, and I am just grateful I once knew that time in history.

So here I am. A woman who has deliberately, joyfully, and sometimes stubbornly built a life with almost no technology… genuinely annoyed that her technology isn’t working.

The irony is not lost on me.

But here’s what I keep coming back to. On those two days when the service disappeared completely, when my phone became nothing more than an expensive paperweight, I didn’t panic. I didn’t spiral. I wrote. I walked. I chopped wood. I did exactly what I would have done anyway, minus the emails. And honestly? Those were two of the most productive, peaceful days I’ve had in a long time.

Maybe the universe is trying to tell me something. Maybe the cell service isn’t getting worse. Maybe I’m just getting closer to the life I’ve been building all along.

For now, I’m holding out as long as I can… without a $20 credit, and $40 if you count both days… and doing what I have always done.

I’m writing a strongly worded letter.