Discipline

It was supposed to be an all-nighter. Raj once again, tired from his job had given himself a half-hour T.V. break before beginning work on his newest project, a screenplay he had intended to produce with a small group of amateur filmmakers he knew. That half hour became “Just one more episode” and bled into an hour, then two, then before he knew it the glowing hole of a box had consumed his entire evening. Groggy and half asleep he groped for the remote, deciding he couldn’t heave himself out of his hypnagogic state to get his creative juices flowing and resigned himself to at least get to bed on time. As Raj’s fingertips found the remote an ad appeared on his T.V., introducing a phone app called Asimov that would integrate all of one’s electronics, and impose a limit on their usage so the user would find themselves fewer distractions. Intrigued, he rolled to one side and retrieved his smartphone from his sweatpants pocket. His phone lit up, the blue light making him squint his eyes a bit as the camera recognized his face and he found the app store. In it he searched for the Asimov app, it appeared to him, with an inviting “Download now” icon on the screen but he was disappointed to find the app came with a fee. “They think I’m a sucker? I’m not paying for something like this.” he thought and clicked the lock button on his phone, as the screen went black, he saw his stubbled face, and the years of opportunities he wasted came surging back into his mind. “I’m just going to get my life together, there’s no need for me to pay for a computer to do that for me, I’m not a child.” With the confidence that tomorrow would be the day he turned his life around, he made his way into his bedroom and collapsed, happily on the comfortable if a bit worn single-sized mattress. 

The next day, as he nudged his apartment door open with a vigor he hadn’t felt for some time, Raj immediately changed out of his retail store polo shirt, scarfed the Chinese takeout he had picked up for dinner (“No time today to waste cooking at home!” he told himself) and plopped himself down in front of his computer. He sat for a moment, the Word document he had opened had a few paragraphs on it, there was a bar at the top that read “Last edited-two weeks ago.” He began to pick the story up where it left off, just then his phone buzzed. He had had the foresight to set it to vibrate, at least, but now his concentration had been broken wondering what the alert was about. He started again; but the mystery kept creeping back into his mind; the click-clacking of his typing ceased as he had to think for a beat. He looked over at his phone, “Could be an emergency, I guess I better check it out.” He picked his phone up, it was a notification for an email from his regular haunt, the bar down the street, they had a special on wings this weekend. Being a big fan of buffalo wings, he opened the email and read, the deal seemed too good to pass up, so he made a resolution that if he wrote diligently from today (Wednesday) until the weekend, he’d reward himself by redeeming this coupon. Then he remembered his friend had texted him, asking about getting together over the weekend and Raj had neglected to respond, so he opened his message app and texted an apology for not getting back to him sooner and asked if he wanted to get wings Saturday night. While waiting for a reply he pulled up a YouTube video he had been listening to on his ride home from work titled “How to stop procrastinating and achieve your dream!”, he only had about five minutes of the video left and figured it would only take as long for Jake to text him back so he began to watch it. When the video ended his screen was filled with thumbnails for others that promised equally fulfilling things so he chose the one titled, “Secrets to success, you can too!” By the time Jake texted him back, he had watched half a dozen more videos, somehow wound up on one called, “Proof the Romans had alien technology”, he thumbed over to the text app and, with a dejected sigh, read that Jake had already made other plans in the interim while waiting for his reply. Disappointed, he locked his phone and saw the same man, shaven but tired, putting on weight and feeling the years fleeing from him. He looked at his computer, a scant few new sentences on the page and a spark of frustration led him to open his phone, navigate back to the app store and download the Asimov app. With a twinge of regret, he acquiesced to pay the fee and he watched as the download meter slowly ticked away. Within moments, the app was ready to run, Raj selected it from his home screen and it buzzed to life. The small icon grew to envelope the whole screen and the welcome page splashed open.  

“Hello,” it began in a cool, masculine voice, “I am Asimov, here to help you get your life on track.” Raj said nothing, he began reading the text on the menu screen. “I see your name is Raj, is that how you would like me to address you? 

Raj paused for a moment, then said aloud, “Yeah, I’m Raj.”  

“Nice to meet you.” The camera lens on his phone seemed to eye him, sizing him up. “What can I do for you, Raj?” 

“Well, I’m tired of feeling like I’m not accomplishing anything, I’m working on a short film screenplay and I can’t seem to stay focused long enough to get anything done,” Raj felt a twinge of embarrassment admitting his faults to a computer. 

“I can help you with that, what I suggest we do is you set for me a certain amount of time a day you want to be more productive and when the time comes, I can deactivate your non-essential electronics in the house.” 

“What if there’s an emergency?” Raj cocked his head. 

“In an emergency situation I can give you back control over your phone, no problem.”  

A mixture of nerves and excitement came over him, he hesitated for a moment but then said, ”Okay, Asimov, I guess my future is in your hands.” 

After going through the necessary motions of linking his TV, computer, sound bar, video game consoles and various other electronics to his phone, he was presented with a prompt to authorize the Asimov app to maintain control over them. There was an optional setting for an emergency bypass code that, if Raj felt the need to, he could simply deactivate Asimov and regain control over any of his electronics he wished. He slid the button to enable this feature and typed in a simple code he wouldn’t forget, then proceeded to finish and let Asimov run. 

“Okay, Raj, when and for how long do you want to have productivity time?”  

“For today, I want to write until bedtime, I really need to catch up on this.” 

“Okay, until you’re ready for bed.” His phone went to a blank screen, displaying only a button that said “Emergency override?”, the television blipped off, his computer screen returned from screensaver, the YouTube tabs had been closed and the cursor sat, blinking at the end of his last sentence, anticipating him. He locked his phone and sat down to write. 

After a time shorter than he would have liked, Raj drew a blank on the next sentence. He tilted his head back and gazed at the ceiling for a moment, thinking about what his character should say next. The urge to google a tidbit of information he had had a discussion about earlier with a coworker came to him. He picked his phone up, unlocked it and was greeted with the same “Emergency override?” button. Guiltily, he tapped the button and entered his code, immediately, Asimov’s voice came over the phone speaker. 

“Is there an emergency, Raj?” 

A prick of surprise went through Raj as he said, “No, I’m just googling something real quick.”  

“Is it pertaining to your writing, Raj?” 

“Not really.” 

“Then I must remind you that right now you need to be focusing, it’s productivity time, remember?” Raj felt a hint of judgement in the softness of Asimov’s voice. 

“Yeah, I do, but this’ll just take a second.” 

“I really must advise you that this is a distraction from your work, however, I cannot stop you.” Raj shrugged off the feeling that he was disappointing Asimov and googled the trivia he was curious about. As he opened a new tab, the endless column of clickbait news articles drew his eye, he saw one about a lost interview with his favorite screenwriter and opened it in a new tab, saving it for later. He googled “Oldest civilizations” and found an article that gave a diagram of the Earth with highlighted areas in Mesopotamia, the Indus River Valley, western South America and so on, explaining that the six oldest civilizations appeared around the globe at relatively similar times, then after skimming the article, he followed a link to a YouTube video expounding on the history of the Incas, when the new tab for the video opened he saw the article he had previously meant to save for later and decided it couldn’t wait. 

After a time, Raj got hungry and decided he needed a pick-me-up, as he locked his phone, he saw the same man reflected back at him in the black screen, the soft light of his desk lamp betraying a face that seemed to age by the day. He glanced over at his computer screen, the blinking cursor in nearly the same position as before. 

Frustrated, he picked his phone up and opened Asimov, he went to the settings and deactivated the “Emergency Override” option.