Smart vs. Dumb Cell phones

I've had my cell phone for a while now and I was successfully resisting the temptation to switch. My cell phone had the ability to go online but it was painfully slow. My partner who has an iPhone, would poke fun at mine saying "maybe when your phone grows up it may be an iphone." When ever I looked up directions or the GPS, it would take for ever to load.
So I decided to get a Smart phone, only to realize how non-smart I am about this technology. I was amazed to how much the phone can do. My 13 year old son called me and was telling me about the apps we could download (he got one too, and learned to use it in a day!). I didn't even know what an app was. Anyway, though I'm happy to have the phone, I feel frustrated with the amount of time it will take me to learn how to use it. Then I realize how much time we spend using these smart phones and I wonder if all that time is wisely invested (or what seems to me as wasted). Not to mention that the battery runs out pretty fast when you use the phone for all this other stuff. I often wonder, have really become so dependent on technology? I remember a time when one could go through the day without a cell phone or the internet.