Rule Breaking Justifier 

I went on a field trip today.  I love field trips for two reasons:

1.  They are usually to cool places.

2.  I get one on one time with my kids.

Today's field trip was no exception.  Philly zoo.  Me and Cole.  Fantastic.

There is one down side of field trips tho.  The bus ride.  Because the noise.  And the bumpiness.  And the constantly in motion kids (Seriously, dudes.  Just. Be.STILL).  And also the noise.

Did I mention bus rides are loud?

Being an introvert I find it not worth it too difficult to try to carry on a conversation over the noise.  Besides, this was a longish bus ride.  If I started a conversation then there was the pressure of trying to keep it going the WHOLE TIME.  My life is pretty boring, people.  I don't have that much material.

Normally on a bus ride I would text people to pass the time.  But this month's 7 fast is media.  I am only giving one hour a day to media (blogging doesn't count) and only returning important texts and emails.

So what did I do?  I justified texting my sister-in-law who was just a few seats behind me.  I mean, come on.  If she was sitting right behind me I would have chatted with her so texting isn't that much different, right?

Then my phone rang.  Of course I couldn't answer it over the noise of 20 excited first graders so I let it go to voice mail.  With one finger shoved in my left ear I listened to the message with my right.  I needed to respond and I'm terrible at returning phone calls so this was an acceptable time to text and I did so.

Then I threw caution completely to the wind.   You see, I should have stopped with one cup of coffee this morning.  But I didn't and at this point in the bus ride my bladder was paying the price.  Did I mention bus rides are bumpy?  I needed a distraction.  I let my thumbs do the talking.  

Pretty soon I had 10 text message conversations going.  Four friends.  Four co-workers.  One sister-in-law.  One sister.

"Rules are meant to be broken" is a line I heard often while I was growing up.  Also, "those rules aren't meant for Leamans".  That's some solid Ted teaching right there.  Being a Harting for 12 years has done little to take the Leaman out of me.

I happily went on sending texts that were not Legitimately Important Texts (LITs).  They were Silly Texts, Food Texts, Border-line Inappropriate Texts.  Hashtag Texts, Kid Texts, I Have to Pee Texts.

One friend texted this: "Just read thru that whole conversation again.  I love when u do media fasts.  I think that was the most txting we did for months. :) "

And my reply?  "lol, oh my word.  At the zoo now, no more silliness.  Peace out, homie."

I am so weird.

I'm not even sure what the point of this blog post is.  I guess just to confess to you that on day 3 of the media fast I failed totally and completely.

Ok, so if we want to be brutally honest, I actually failed on the VERY FIRST day.  But it was different than today.  Today I willingly broke my own rules.  On Sunday I just forgot.  

Sunday evening I posted this as my status:  

"for the month of june i am giving only 1 hour a day to media/technology.  i will answer important emails/texts but if you want to be silly or sarcastic of just simply conversational with me it's gonna have to be in person.

i am not super thrilled about this month of 7."

A few hours later I sent LITs to two friends, inviting them to breakfast.  One accepted.  One declined.  Both text conversations spiraled into silliness.  I didn't think twice about it until one of them responded with this:  "Do these count as important texts because if not your month has already been ruined..."

Cruditty, crud, crud, CRUD.  

I thought I didn't have a problem with media.  I'm not uber connected.  You know, no smart phone, no laptop, no ipad, no cable, no DVR.  I don't watch that much TV.  And radio?  I can take it or leave it.  But I do love me some texting.  And Facebook. And salted caramel pretzel bark (which has nothing to do with media.  I'm just listing things I'm addicted to).

Tomorrow is a new day.  Another chance to follow my own rules.  And like I said in a text today:

"At least Jesus still loves me"

The reply? "Always and forever and that's all that should matter!!"