Finding value in little things, the simple life

Abraham Villarreal
3 min readJul 11, 2021
Photo by Koto Kyoto on Unsplash

I have a friend named Jean. She doesn’t have a smartphone. She’s never purchased anything online for herself. If she needs something, she drives down to the grocery store. If she misses a call, she calls back when she’s ready. When she pays for something she uses cash.

She lives on her time and does things her way. When the world is moving too fast. Jean sits and waits. She knows that things will eventually make their way around to her corner of the world. She doesn’t mind waiting.

I like Jean’s way of life even though I don’t see myself living as she does. When I get a text or call I answer right away. I don’t want to keep people waiting. I know they don’t like it. If I need new shoes or a home gadget that I can’t find at the local store, I get online using my smartphone and purchase it in seconds.

It’s nice to have everything you need in the palm of your hand. Jean doesn’t see it that way even though she believes she has everything she needs. Jean is from a time and place that doesn’t exist anymore and the more I learn about it, the more I see the value in that time gone by.

There have been many occasions when I encouraged Jean to get a new phone. I told her that she didn’t know what she was missing. After all, how can someone live in the past? On other days, when I really needed…

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Abraham Villarreal

People are interesting. I write about them and what makes them interesting.