YOUTH MATTERS Ellie Till...I just can't live without my laptop

Now, before you indignantly put aside your toast and marmite (alright, maybe I am speaking for everyone now, at least with regard to breakfast preference) to comment that, actually it’s your mobile phone you rely on, my point is I fear that technology, specifically the internet, is the first thing most younger people think about when they wake up in the morning (or in the case of many students I know, including myself, the afternoon).

Apart from one I can think of, all my friends are never seen without their smartphone. I’m not complaining, because I’m the same myself. I’m aware there are many people that mock the modern trend to tweet people what they had for breakfast, or post a photo of their plate of dinner on Facebook. I had a friend who almost fell out with me when I unfollowed them on Twitter due to their tendency to tweet what they were doing every five minutes. (‘I’m playing darts.’ ‘I’m in the car.’ ‘I’m swimming.’ Clearly, you aren’t. You’re typing on your laptop.)

However, my real concern is my own dependence on my laptop. In my first year of university, my laptop’s screen broke. I called my parents, weeping down the phone, declaring I wanted to come home. They weren’t too impressed, mainly because I had just got in from a night out and it was four in the morning at the time. Although alcohol may have played a part, I still maintain my devastation was mainly down to my broken limb – sorry, I mean laptop.

I was without it for about six years. All right, it was really about a week. I found myself going for walks, reading books, admiring nature...It was horrible.

I embraced my replacement laptop with all the devotion of an abandoned puppy, and when that one broke down two years later, I went into shock.

Luckily, the lovely computer repairman fixed it only two days later and I almost married him out of gratitude. However, I decided against it, because I didn’t want to cheat on the love of my life. My laptop, that is.