Determination

    

"A failure establishes only this, that our determination to succeed was not strong enough." John Christian Bovee

This anecdotal blog posting is about the persistence and relentless that fuel determination and bring about success.

A little known fact about me is that I am rough on mobile phones. Well, my present phone was not excluded from my abuse. I have dropped this phone several times (on cement). The last drop was the "straw that broke the camel's back", as far as the phone was concerned. It had had enough. My nice glass (that I thought was hard plastic because it never shattered the last nine times that I dropped it), cracked in several places. Thankfully, the phone was still operational. (Yes, I do have a case for the phone. No, the phone was not in the case, because I was using it in my car. And it was nicely lying in my lap, where I placed it after I used it, when I got out of my car, it fell to the ground and the glass broke in several places.) Because the phone is a company issued phone, I thought, surely, insurance would cover a replacement. When I inquired the next morning, I was met with a dreaded, "No, we do not have insurance." My next thought was, I will not be replacing this phone myself. I would use it until the glass literally crumbles in my hand, then buy a cheap replacement on eBay. (Okay, not prudent, I know.) Well, because the phone is touch screen, chards of glass quickly loosened with use. My solution: clear packing tape to hold it all together. (Hey, it worked!)

I subsequently showed my damaged phone to my teammates, two of which, who coincidentally, also shattered the glass on their mobile phones. (Boy, those I.T. folks can be rough on phones.) One had an iPhone and paid Apple to repair it, and almost paid for another phone with what it cost to repair his. The other teammate, a more determined (and frugal) soul, like myself, found the replacement glass with tools on eBay, and repaired the phone himself. I was all ears, and proceeded to do the same. It seemed simple enough, so I was all in. For good measure, and the future safety of my new glass, I also ordered a new protective case, which allows phone use without removal of the phone, and has a hard, protective, plastic cover for the front of the phone.

Well, my replacement glass and protective case finally arrived. Replacing the glass was not as simple as it looked, and the glass came without the tools. I consulted with my like-souled teammate, who quickly retrieved a "do-it-yourself" video on the Internet on replacing the glass on my Droid phone. After viewing the first video, I realized this would be a multi-step process and the (two-minute) video that I was viewing seemed to be missing some steps. I found a more comprehensive (16-minute) video, and discovered that replacing the glass was not as simple as popping off the cover and popping in the new glass. It involved a gentle prying tool, a micro Phillips head screwdriver, and removing tape, joints and ribbons. Thank God, I viewed the whole video before disassembling my phone. It looked too big a job for me. It seemed to require an engineer or at least, a Verizon phone or hardware tech.

After consulting again with my teammate, and being encouraged my his successful repairing of his phone, coupled with the thought of almost paying for another phone, if I had it professionally repaired, with borrowed tools, I proceeded to follow the instructions in the 16-minute video. I was "on a roll". I thought to myself, "This is not exactly work-related, but I should get some award for phone repair." I was determined and relentless, and I was fixing that phone! (SCHREECH!!!!!!!! This is the loud sound of brakes.) The euphoria lasted all the way until the end of the 16-minute video, and I already had everything disassembled, down to the broken glass, when the creator of the video said, "Stay tuned for part two in my next video on actually removing the broken glass". The air left me. I thought I was home free. But now, I was deflated. I had two options: (1) reassemble the phone (quite a feat in and of itself), or (2) continue on to remove and replace the broken glass. The issues that I encountered in (17-minute) video #2 were that the fix involved prying the glass from the frame (it did not pop out -- it had a strong adhesive) and using acetone to clean off the adhesive residue and super glue to reseal it once the glass was replaced (liquid, glue and electronics - I wasn't comfortable with that).

I was now at the point of no return, fix it or suck it up and either replace it or get it repaired -- at this point, since I disassembled it, I was sure that Verizon was not going to accept any liability in the event that I damaged the phone beyond repair. And I was still not ready to purchase another phone. Okay, so with a determined, unrelenting spirit, I took the road less-traveled, and forged ahead to finish my repair of the phone. It was a two-day process, because I was exhausted just from video #1, and I did not have any super glue to attach the glass anyway. I left the phone, disassembled, in what seemed like one hundred little pieces, and stored it in a safe place until the next day.

On the next day, with a renewed energy, a fresh outlook, and continued determination, I proceeded to follow video #2, to complete the replacement of the glass and the repair and reassembling of the phone. Removing the sticky residue that the two-sided adhesive tape left took hours (not minutes), between applying heat to soften it, scraping and pulling off what I could, and wiping off the rest with acetone (then more effective rubbing alcohol). The earphone for the phone was in this frame that I was scraping and wiping. At this point, my thought was on the phone's usability once it was, prayerfully, reassembled. I finally got the frame, to which I would be applying the new glass with super glue, clean and free of sticky residue. The seemingly momentous task of reassembling the rest of the phone was ahead of me. I restarted video #2, and painstakingly followed the steps outlined to put my phone back together again, taking care not to miss one of those "100 pieces".

With two "casualties" (the first one being one of the ribbon joint locks coming off and not being able to put it back on), I was able to successfully reassemble my phone. I tested the phone before putting in the final screws that held it nicely in place, and it worked perfectly. I had a little difficulty securing the battery house that covered the hard drive in place before placing the screws, and once the phone was fully reassembled, I discovered the second casualty. When I was screwing the battery house onto the frame of the phone, I cracked the LCD (under the glass), which was perfectly fine during the repair process.

I was happy that I conquered a major feat in replacing the glass, but a little sad that I got all the way to the end, only to crack the LCD. The good news is, the small crack is in the lower left-hand corner of the screen, and does not affect the functioning of the phone. It will simply serve as a reminder of how my persistence and determination paid off.

My newly self-repaired, fully functional phone is now safe in its Otterbox Defender case. I won't be quitting my day job to become a mobile phone repair tech. And if my phone somehow breaks again, I will not be doing self-repair again. Being under that kind of pressure once was enough for me! I will either pay to repair or pay to replace it. But I will continue to be the determined, relentless soul that I am!

Jacinta M. Gray,
The Couch Coach