Communicating via cell phones

Hi neighbors. Although summer has officially started, we still have a few weeks before those phone calls start with people telling us who to vote for. Even cell phone numbers will get those calls now.

There's a lot to be said for having a cell phone. They've filled the void of those hand-to-face actions cigarettes used to provide. Also, people can reach you at any and all times.

There's a lot to be said for landline phones. You can't lose them and people can NOT reach you at any and all times.

People might not be able to get me immediately, but they will hear from me as soon as I check my messages.

How important is it to be immediately available anyway? Oh, I know people say they need their cell phone for emergencies. How many emergencies do people have now that they didn't have before cell phones? Most of the people I hear talking on cell phones are either walking down the street, walking around in a store, or driving a car.

What are they talking about? Not emergencies. What's for dinner? What should I buy at this store? When will you (me, the kids, the dog, the friends, etc.) be home for dinner, done with practice, ready to be picked up, ready to be delivered, finished talking on the phone? The usual introduction to every conversation is "where are you now? and/or what are you doing?" The other is often, "Where are the kids? What are they doing? Have you talked with them in the last hour?" Somewhere we have gotten past normal conversation and into data delivery.

My favorite cell phone users to eaves-drop on are shoppers when they call for advice on what to buy.

For instance, men will look until they find an article they know they were supposed to buy. Suddenly they realize there are a multitude of choices of the same product. They take one off the shelf, read the box -- all four sides and the top at least twice. They pick up another box and turn it over a few times then sit it back down.

They frown, then they call whoever sent them to the store in the first place.

They answer the "where are you and what are you doing" questions then cut to the chase. "What kind of cereal was it I was supposed to get? There's 10 kinds of flakes here..." They stand listening, shifting their weight from one foot to the other, still holding the original box of flakes.

Somewhere in the conversation they look desperately up and down the aisle, shrug their shoulders, put their free hand on their hip and roll their eyes.

Once they start nodding their head in bored silence, they quickly end the conversation, snap the phone shut, throw the original box of flakes into the shopping cart and walk quickly away.

Women, on the other hand, usually don't waste time calling home for selection advice. They don't need to...if they are buying groceries they'll buy what they want to cook.

If a woman was sent by a man to buy some thing at a tool or hardware store she would ask the counter person to help her find the thingie-mageegee he had sent her to get. If the store clerk(s) needed help understanding her request, THEY could call the man who should have come to find the stupid piece of metal thingie-mageegee himself in the first place! They would have to use the store phone though as she would be taking calls on her cell phone from the children, the baby-sitter, work, friends, the school or the veterinarian.

I won't deny cell phones are wonderful tools and might even be essential when driving on long trips, when someone has health issues, or when expecting important legal calls.

But I can't see them being as necessary as most cell phone users claim they are. Do you need to talk to your child in school every day? Does your child need to talk to you at work? How often do you really have to guess where your spouse is or what they are doing? In a time when communication skills are failing, do we need more high-tech communication tools that encourage barely understandable text-messaging codes like "C U B4 5," for example.

Until the next time friends remember, just because it rings, you don't have to answer it and just because you got it, you don't have to use it.