May 28, 2025
It’s the year 2000, and I was posted behind kiosk inside a Walmart in Pomona, California, selling cellphones out of a one-man booth wedged between the photo center and the shoes. It wasn’t exactly glamorous, but it was my first “corporate” job. I was freshly 18 years old — collared shirt, name badge, and a stack of dummy phones I used for one very high-level marketing strategy: I’d toss them into people’s carts as they walked by.
Seriously. I’d wait for someone pushing a cart, toss one of those plastic demo phones in with a grin, and say, “It looks like your cart’s ready for an upgrade.” Most of the time, they’d laugh. Sometimes they’d stop. And now and then, they’d walk out with a new cell phone plan — and I’d feel like I’d just closed a Fortune 500 deal.
The phones were basic. No internet. No apps. No glow-in-your-face chaos. You could call, maybe text, and if you had snake on there, you were living large.
Back then, I sold phones that helped people connect. Now, I carry one that helps me disconnect.
It has no browser. No email. No social media.
It’s intentionally minimal — a kind of technological sabbath in your pocket. And when I’m with Jen on a date, or out with friends, or just trying to be where my feet are, I bring it with me. I leave the iPhone behind.
It doesn’t just change the pace. It changes my actions.
No more endless scroll of headlines, stories, and tiny dopamine hits disguised as notifications.
Solomon built gardens, empires, estates, and legacies. And still, when he finally stopped to look at what it cost… he realized how easy it is to lose the thread.
I’m not saying a minimalist phone is the fix. But it might be a start.
It might be a small, tangible way to say: I choose presence over performance. I choose people over pings. I choose clarity over the blur.
And every time I pull that Light Phone out of my pocket, I think about that kid in Pomona with the dummy phones and the name badge — hustling for connection in the simplest way he knew how.
Turns out, that’s still the goal.
