I have a love affair with my cell phone. I'm exaggerating when I say this, but only barely. My cell phone accompanies me everywhere I go, from room to room. I will never forget my phone while I may forget money or ID or house keys. Heck, I'll even forget my glasses before my cell phone.

I'm not obsessed with it, but it's my link to the world. To the internet, to social media, to friends and family. I spend a lot of time with my phone and online. My phone is where I organize my life. It's my camera, my diary, and the most important device I own.

My dependence on technology could be considered unhealthy, but I'm not alone. Technology has always been a part of my life, and I use it even more in my teenage years.

Technology has made life much easier. People can contact me instantly. In class, I will Google what I don't know and take pictures of homework questions or work. I had Facebook, and I left Facebook. I use my instagram often and I spend an embarrassing amount of time on Twitter.

The internet is a source of inspiration and creative expression. It improves my writing and introduced me to new concepts and ideas. That's not to say everything in internet land is perfect.

There are problems with social media. Not even the obvious problems like cyber bullying, but what happens when everything you do is there to be seen by everyone? Or randomly being attacked by some troll when you tweeted something negative about their favourite hockey team? There are so many times that I love the Internet and technology but it hurts to. Even small things like being addicted to Candy Crush and the compulsion to keep playing matter.

What I'm getting at is that social media and technology is a part of day to day life. It's something I don't see enough of in YA. You could argue it's the YA I read, but there are so many little things that come with this dependence in technology that deserve some more light.

Technology almost never gets name dropped in YA beyond those books that namedrop everything because they're about rich people. I think that's unrealistic to teenage life, and so I'd like to see books use technology better. One amazing example was in Boy Nobody. The main character had this badass iPhone that was wired to do incredible and special things because he's a solider.

Technology can make books so much more realistic, and it should definitely be used more often.

-P.E.