Phones

An I-phone is nothing more than a guarantee that you will never be left alone again. I assume the younger generation doesn't give wit about being alone with their own thoughts. Just the thought of that type of silence scares my wife to her core, but her generation came up on Kool Aide and chaos, so she gets somewhat of a pass. The next generation always has to have some kind of noise to fill the silence. I, on the other hand need solitude, at times I crave it. Solitude and loneliness are not the same thing, but they are sometimes confused for one another These days peace and quiet is the only way for me to keep myself centered, grounded if you will.

We humans have a curious past with our mobile phones, almost to the point of hilarity.

Remember when the guy down the street that owned a Hugo had an antenna on top of that car that was so long it looked like he was trying to communicate with Mars? Remember when they went from being just car phones to being the kind we carry but they were the size of a human leg bone? But just like any Technolgy as time goes on the size gets smaller and so does the cost, that is until the greedy among us realize people will do anything to have one in their pocket. These days it's not even strange to see them go for over a thousand bucks. Mark my words, were I not married I would NOT have one. I'd be that old cat everyone makes fun of that still has a land line and a half-decerped answering machine.

I remember not so many years ago when I laid down in the afternoon for a couple of hours for a nap and turned my phone off like I always do. My mom called when I was sleeping and when I woke up and called her back, she began berating me for being out of touch. It cracks me up when people are self-centered enough to think that the world cannot do without them for a couple of hours. In the whole world right now there are like five emergencies, what are the chances one of them is going to involve me? Of course, she started to hit me with the same old mom questions, for instance, "what if someone had died up here." (BTW she lives in Wichita and I'm in Broken Arrow Oklahoma just for a bit of context). I don't think she appreciated it when I answered with, "well, when I woke up wouldn't they STILL be dead? Why doesn't the old girl seem to have a sense of humor anymore? I remember the good old days when granny would tell us that unless we could be cured by bacon fat or Campho Phenique we were going to die? I love that kind of logic (AKA humor) and I miss it.

The point I am trying so desperately to make is my phone works for me not the other way around. I know people who nearly seem frightened to shut their phones off. Just remember folks, it's a piece of technology not a family member. There are days when my phone brings me nothing but bad news and I'd like nothing more than to run over it and toss the broken pieces in the river, and were I not married I'd already done it.

And how many times have you taken the time to visit a local store and when you are ready to check out you get stalled by a customer service person holding you up to help out a person who has called in. Well, I ask you, who is more important, the person who has taken the time to drive to your store to make an actual purchase or the lazy cat at home setting on his ass who is on the horn trying to find the best price on tube socks? Why is it these days we tend to reward laziness? Whatever happened to the early bird getting the worm?