Cell Phone Ponderings

It's an interesting phenomenon, cell phones are. Yes, I have one. But I hardly use it. During this summer, it has rarely been on. During the school year, I would have it on constantly, in case one of my daughters had to reach me. I also had them call me daily when they got home from school, although that routine began to die out as the year wore on. Now, my phone is usually only turned on when I go out in case someone needs to reach me, or if I was in an accident or something and needed to call 9-1-1. Since it is now illegal to use your cell phone when you drive (a secondary offense), I use it even less.

So I was surprised the other day when, as I was heading out to my car to go on some errands and turned on my cell phone, it rang indicating that I had some voicemail messages. I gave them a listen, and they surprised me.

The first two messages were from my next-door neighbor. She had been out of town for the day with her family, and some torrential rains came. She was worried about the fact that she had left some windows open at home, and was wanting me to go close them.

Now, I was home at the time when she called me on my cell phone. And when I'm home, I do not have my cell phone on. Why should I? I have a perfectly good phone at home. Had she called me at home, I would have scooted over to her house and closed the windows. As it was, she couldn't get ahold of me, so then had to call another neighbor, and then call me back, telling my to never mind the window request. Had she called my home phone in the first place, it would have saved her the two more calls she had to make.

The third message was from my mother-in-law. We had made plans to bring the girls over to her place to spend the night, as it was my birthday and Eric and I were going out to dinner and to see A Chorus Line. In typical fashion, the times that we'd drop off the girls was not definite; I'm sure Eric told his mom we'd be over "4ish." As we got close to his mom's complex, he broke the law and called her on his cell phone to let her know we'd be arriving in about five minutes. She was going to meet us at this back door that is kept locked, but is closer to her apartment.

But there was no answer to Eric's call. So he left a message, saying we were almost there. We got to the complex and parked next to her car, but we couldn't see her by the door. So Eric called again, but no one answered. He left another message saying "We're here!"

We sat in the car, wondering what to do. Should I walk around to the main entrance and go find her? We got out of the car, and pulled out the overnight gear. Just as we were contemplating further as to what our next step should be, she appeared at the back door. We gathered the girls and the gear, and went to the door. It all worked out.

But the third message on my cell phone? She had heard the two messages from Eric, and had called MY cell phone to reply. Why she called my cell phone I do not know, as it was Eric who had called. It's funny that even she assumed I'd have my cell phone on and with me. So it isn't just a generational thing.

How did we survive without them? I think I still could.