Just Thinkin’ -
Listen to the rumbles, listen to the roars; They woke me. I reluctantly stirred. I listened, heard nothing more, so I settled back beneath the covers. The sounds returned.
I grumbled some fittingly unkind words, got up and moved toward the kitchen where Billie was already up and putting on the coffee.
I said, “Good morning. America must be blowing out the motors early.”
“They’re tearing down the plastic surgeon’s old office.”
About then, something, perhaps a wall, fell and I knew America wasn’t the culprit. Billie and I talked and agreed nothing stays the same. Maybe whatever the new retail space is, it will not be too bad.
I sipped coffee and thought about being awakened on a summer or fall morning in Stigler. It seems it was smell, not sound, that cracked my sleep. The cannery smell.
I once spoke negatively of the odor to my grandfather. He suggested I learn to enjoy the fragrance of jobs. I have come to know how right he was.
I thought about going to the corner to take a photo of the building before it was gone. I picked up my phone to take a photo. Times do really change.
I started my telephone life by just picking up the phone and a voice said, “Operator.” I said the number I wanted to call and she plugged me in. Number 66 got me Hays and Buchanan all the way in downtown Stigler. Miracle enough for me.
My parents spoke of a time when the phone box on the wall had a hand crank.
The first change I remember came with the dial telephone. I didn’t have to go through an operator. Privacy was enhanced. No one knew who and when you were calling.
But I liked the operator telling me my granddad had just made a call from the Haskell County Tribune.
“He’s likely there having a cup of coffee with Dad Bankhead. Do you want me to try there for you?”
Push buttons then replaced dials. Do you remember having a Princess phone in your bookcase headboard? If the phone rang in the middle of the night, you didn’t have to stumble to a central location where your phone was installed.
Then, came the portable phone. You never had to run to a central location in your home to answer the telephone again. No more sitting in the hallway to talk.
I remember my first car phone. The signal bouncing off cell towers. The status antenna.
Then, the cell phone. My daughter-in-law bought me an iPhone. Not an iPhone 1, it was a 2, I think.
Do you think we talked as skillfully to each other as when we had to crank the phone?
Mr. Watson, come here. I want to see you. – Alexander Graham Bell
