Apparently, I am supposed to have a phone that does everything but whistle Dixie. A flat, rectangular thing that covers my palm and connects me to news events and the very latest ridiculous thing on Twitter.

And allows me to be overtly rude by staring at it while I am in a group of people.

That phone also should be able to take quite nice photos and record videos … and, well, do a bunch of other stuff. Make me breakfast, direct me to the lost island of Atlantis. Things like that.

Smartphones they call them.

I, however, am sticking with my six-year-old dumbphone.

It may have cost, maybe, $25, when we bought it here in Abu Dhabi. Maybe less.

It’s tiny. A Samsung phone about an inch-and-a-half wide and three long. It fits into about any pocket ever invented. Very handy.

Here is what I use it for:

–Calling people.

–Receiving calls.

–Sending and receiving text messages.

–A mobile phone book, for calling people without actually knowing any numbers. Co-workers, mostly.

My dinky Samsung can do other stuff, but I don’t ask for much of anything else.

It has a little light on it, the FM radio player, alarms, a calendar, a game (just the one) … no thanks. Not necessary.

I think many of us reach a point where we can’t be bothered to learn new technology and resist using it — and certainly resist paying for it.

It’s an age-related thing, I imagine. After a person goes through 3-4-5 cycles of new technology, we just get tired of learning a new bunch of stuff. Especially when you know that another batch of technology is maybe 18 months away. For instance, wasn’t BlackBerry a big thing just the other day? And now it’s gone, and if you have one it’s rather like admitting you bought an Edsel.

As far as I am concerned, I know all the technology I need to know. I am a conscientious objector in future technology wars. (Hell no, I won’t go.)

Trouble is, my handy, non-invasive little Samsung probably was not meant to last this long and I worry it may die on me before I can die on it.

It might have too much information in it. I try to clear out “messages sent” and every time I enter that part of the messaging system … it crashes the phone.

I also face what seems to be steadily more difficult times trying to send texts.

I can’t send something more than a dozen characters in length without the phone stalling out on me … and then I stare at the tiny screen before it finally burps … and blinks back to life.

To send a two-sentence text … might be a five-minute task.

My other concern is that the phone will conk out before I get around to transcribing the phone numbers in it.

I could be doing that right now, but I’m lazy, and it hasn’t jumped up and bit me yet.

I hope to nurse this dumbphone right through my stay in the UAE, and then I can give it a Viking funeral, and burn it … but that would not be environmentally responsible, would it?

I can’t say I love my dumbphone. Not when it has begun seizing up on me.

But it has allowed me to sit out the smartphone era so far, and I am grateful for that.