People of Red Hook: August 2026

This is New York City, but today nobody’s rushing. People are lollygagging down the streets while the 95-degree heat penetrates their bones. So it’s not too hard to get them to stop and talk to me about their relationships with their phones—the very phones that most of them are staring into before our conversations begin.  

Christopher Loyd:

I’m trying to download classic movies. Like on AMC. I was just looking up Christopher Lee’s Dracula. 

That is truly a classic. So you download movies to watch on your phone. 

Yes. I love classic TV too. Lucille Ball is my favorite. And Ricky Ricardo. They were together for decades.

So you actually watch reruns of I love Lucy?

I love Lucy, yeah!

Well, you are an unusual person. That was some great TV. Lucille Ball was a comic genius. 

I’m interested in classic movies, and also classic TV. Good Times, Family Matters, Who’s the Boss…

So you’re in touch with the whole history of TV and cinema. That’s pretty cool. Do you like to watch new movies as well as classics?

Yeah. Mortal Kombat 2 just came out. So that’s exciting. 

So you have a really good relationship with your phone. You have a Samsung. You’re satisfied with the way it functions? 

Yes. Very satisfied. I just have to switch the SD card, because if I want more movies, I need more room. I already selected what needs to be transferred. So I can get literally hundreds of movies and TV shows!

Would you say that your primary enjoyment using your phone is watching stuff?

Also engagement. I talk to people. I like podcasts, going back and forth with them. 

So you actually interact with podcasts. You don’t just listen to them. 

Yeah, I definitely engage. 

Kelly Coyle:

I appreciate the many things that my phone does. I appreciate that we don’t have to print out maps or we can make calls to our parents at any time. But weighing the pros and cons, I think our phones make it tougher to live in modern society. I admire people who have been able to fully get off their smart phones, to detach from modern technology, and go back to using dumb phones, or whatever. I think that’s cool. 

You don’t think you have the discipline to walk away from your smartphone?

I’m afraid of losing ways to keep in touch with friends, family, and stuff like that. But I don’t have social media in any major way now, like Instagram or TikTok.

So in general, you have misgivings about our dependence on our phones.

Yes, and just what they do to us, mentally. Everything I’ve read says that we’re more socially anxious, and alone, and depressed than we’ve ever been before. 

And you think a lot of this can be attributed to having these phones.

Definitely. They interact with our brains in a way that makes them addictive. A lot of apps keep us chasing the dopamine kick. 

So the irony is that at the same time that our phones connect us with one another, they isolate us from one another.

Yeah, and make us overthink and be in our own heads about what we don’t have. But still, they’re the main form of communication. Like, I can’t get into my office building without scanning my phone badge. 

That’s true. What if we didn’t have email? We need it for everything.

Exactly. There are so many ways that our society requires us to have a digital identity. 

Manny Sanchez (A Red Hook elder):

You say you don’t have a relationship with your phone. 

No, I don’t. I don’t live on my phone 24/7. I pick it up, check it, put it down. This younger generation lives on the phone 24/7. If you shut down all technology, they wouldn’t know what to do with themselves. They would have no clue. 

Our generation didn’t have cell phones for most of our lives. 

We had TV, and that was it. For a while only rich people could afford color TV!

But people were more connected to one another. Do you agree?

Yeah! When we were kids we went out and did things. We socialized. We played tag, hide and seek, everything like that. Kids today wouldn’t know what to do with any of that stuff. 

Sienna Jevremov:

I have a kind of bittersweet love for my phone. I am well aware that it’s a source of addiction, but also is a source of entertainment and comfort and makes life, obviously, incredibly easy. I love that it makes being educated easier. There are ways I can look up plants I want to know of and use Google, or I can listen to audiobooks. But also on this other side, it means that I’m constantly on it in a way that makes me feel a little disconnected, which sometimes can be good in New York City, because New York is a lot…

You’re from England?

Yeah, but I’ve lived here for 24 years.

Well, after 24 years you’re a New Yorker. But this city can be a lot, as you put it. So with everything going on, sometimes you feel like you get kind of stuck in your phone. 

Yeah. There are even certain applications I’ve had to full-on delete because when I felt boredom coming on I would instinctually go to them, almost without being aware of it. I wouldn’t allow myself to be bored for one moment.

So it was annoying to you, to feel that compulsion. 

Yeah, exactly. The lack of control is not something I want to be subjected to when it comes to a phone.

Rafael Fondeur:

I love my phone, because it’s like a part of me, another organ or something…

You mean like an extension of yourself. 

Yes, exactly. I get everything I need on my phone. There was a time last year when I got hurt on social media and I gave up my phone for, like, three months. I wanted to isolate myself. I wanted to cut everybody off. I didn’t go on Instagram, YouTube, or anything. And it was no good. It doesn’t work to cut yourself off like that, because you need to know what’s going on in the world around you. You should know what happened in the Middle East, what happened in Europe. 

You don’t have a TV? Or a laptop?

No.

So your phone is your window to the world. 

Yes, exactly. It’s like a gold mine. You can stay connected to people with your phone. You can watch the news every day. You can start your own company on your phone. You can go to school on your phone. You can write a book on your phone! 

Well, I’m a writer, and I write on my laptop, but I’m old school. Do you watch movies on your phone? 

I watch movies all the time. 

But the phone is so little! When you go to the movies you have this great big screen.

Well, I think the size of my screen is pretty good. (He shows it to me, and it looks like a normal cell phone.) 

So you think our phones are good for our society. 

Yeah! But you have to have good intentions. If you use your phone for good things, it will bring good things back to you.   

Jennie (72 years old):

I don’t bother with my phone. I don’t even walk around with my phone like everybody else. 

But you have one.

My daughter got me one, yeah. When the phone rings, if I don’t recognize it, I don’t answer. I blackball those numbers. I only answer if it’s my family or my doctors. 

And do you use your phone for any other purpose other than to talk on it?

Nope, that’s it. I’m not even carrying it now that I’m going into the drugstore. 

So you have managed to avoid getting sucked into the technology world. 

Yeah! I lose all my grandchildren’s pictures, because I don’t know what I’m doing with the phone. My daughter says, “This is 2026.” I say, “That’s fine, but I don’t want to know nothing.” It ain’t the greatest world we’re living in. It became wicked, and it’s gotten worse and worse. 

Do you think any of that is because of people getting attached to their phones rather than interacting with each other? 

It’s not just the phones. It’s something that’s been going on for years and years in society. I’m 72. I’ll be 73. You’ll never see me outside, unless I’m in my yard, behind my gate, taking care of my flowers. Too much stuff going on out here now. 

What gives you the most pleasure now? 

My kids. My grandchildren. I’ve got seven grandsons, and one great granddaughter. 

Well, as we say in Yiddish, mazel tov. Can I take your picture? 

Oh, no. All these years, with all the pictures of my grandchildren, weddings, baptisms—you’ll never see me in a picture! 

Crystal (who has silenced notifications and does not use social media): 

What is my relationship with my phone? I’m on it too much.