Today, reaching for a phone, it dawned on me that with the exception of one person, I was surrounded by people who had always dialed 212 or 718 or 917 or 646, and that the experience of picking up a phone and just dialing seven numbers had gone the way of the dodo along with some of my favorite diners, bookstores, cinemas, neighborhoods, streets, cities, and a few people I loved.
*and now for the joke
MAN ONE: Are you a man or a mouse?
MAN TWO: Put a piece of cheese down and find out!
Of Men and Mice...Part One
Of Men and Mice...Part Two
Of Men and Mice... Part Three
5 comments:
Well, my dear, I can remember taking hold of a crank on the side of the phone and reeling off 1 long, one short and one long(or a variation thereof) to call someone. The entire area could pick up their phone and listen in. Every time anyone made a call it rang in the home of everyone on the system. You were only supposed to pick up if it was your ring. It's not that I am as old as dirt (although close); it's just that as a teenager my family moved to a backwater place that was not yet on the Bell system. Time marches on and thankfully there are no more party lines and no more aerobics just to call someone. Nowadays the challenge for the old grey cells is to remember 10 digits for every call you wish to make and 11 for long distance. Personally, I prefer email.
Now THAT'S a post!!!!! Thank you!
wow!!! I only saw that kind of phone system in the movies.... There must be some wonderful (not necessarily happy though) stories about that phone and you....
Wow, great post and comments!
I was just remembering the way I was tethered to the wall when talking on the phone until my parents got a longer cord, which always tangled up. Then we could walk to the kitchen counter! To the fridge! A, the freedom of a cell phone....
Wow, great post and comments!
I was just remembering the way I was tethered to the wall when talking on the phone until my parents got a longer cord, which always tangled up. Then we could walk to the kitchen counter! To the fridge! A, the freedom of a cell phone....
I used to dial only seven digits, with a phone in my room that was older than the one pictured, with a ring that no matter what scared the shit out of me if one of my aunts was calling my mother at the crack of dawn.
..though this memory is from another city. I wish I had a phone like that now. I gave it to my cousin when I moved here. Sort of a evaporating my presence in that house at the same time :)
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