Friday, February 17, 2006

Welcome to the 21st century

Today, I forgot my cell phone at home. You know how it is when you are in a hurry to get to work… there’s always something you forget, be it feeding your pet groundhog, turning off the air conditioning, or pants. Well, I thought I would never feel more naked than that time with the pants, but apparently I was wrong.

I was one of the last people I know to buckle under and buy a cellular phone, and even then I did so because the necessities of the Paranormal Research job demanded it. You know, in case someone hurt themselves running from their own shadow or something, I needed to be able to call all my friends and tell them how funny it was.

Joking. Paranormal Research is serious business.

Anyway, I needed to be able to call for help if something serious happened to one of the participants on my team. I got the cell phone under protest. I had been saying for years that I would never have one of the silly things on my hip because “there are times I don’t want anyone to be able to contact me”. But like I said, I had to get one for the job. I grumbled. I griped. I allowed myself to be dragged kicking and screaming into the brave new millennium.

Now, I feel naked without it. That’s progress for ya. I sit here wanting to call (in order) Dizzy, Stacey, My Dad, My ex-wife, Ringo, Ronnie, my aunt Joann, and of course, Jennifer Aniston. (She goes without saying I suppose. Still owes me five bucks for services rendered.) But I can’t, primarily because my cell has also become my pocket phone list, and I can’t make any long distance calls from here anyway.

I realized I don’t actually dial anymore, or else I would have most of these numbers committed to memory. I just hit the proper speed dial, or look it up in the phone’s list of magic numbers. I have been making fun of Stacey for YEARS for relying on technology for keeping her phone lists, when a piece of paper and a pen work just as well, and don’t run low on batteries. Yet here I sit, equally dependant on that magic little bundle of circuit boards and transistors. It scares me that this little gadget has become so indispensable in my life.

Sometimes I long for the simpler time I grew up in, when you still really “dialed” a phone, and the best source of information about the world outside your window was the ten year old encyclopedia.

3 comments:

Melinda said...

awwwww... You feel naked without your widdle phone. Awwww. haha
I should really be on that list of people you want to call you know. You only have one lesbian. Unless.... have you been cheating on me with other lesbians!?

Stacey said...

Bwahahaha. Now you, too, rely on SIM cards. Neener neener.

Hey! I forgot my phone this morning too, it was sitting on the charger. I was almost to interstate, but I turned around to go get it. I wasn't late to work!

Anonymous said...

"Sometimes...ten year old encyclopedia." Nah. While I am not yet that attached to my portable piece of radioactivity, I definitely could not survive without my computer. I want my instant access and I want it NOW :)