Give me a ring. . .

I really hate telephones. Seriously. Part of my job is to answer phone calls, but I really dislike doing that.

Of course, answering calls isn’t as bad as making them. Especially if I must call someone I don’t know or barely know. It’s all I can do to keep from hyperventilating.

It hasn’t always been that way. Once upon a time I enjoyed talking on the phone. Of course, things were different then.

When I was young, in elementary school, I remember having a phone that looked like this:

 Yes, I had to search the internet for a photo of a rotary phone and found this (it was listed as a “free stock photo”). Remember: at that time we didn’t run around taking pictures of everything. Cameras required film and film was expensive and either took time for processing and printing or was Polaroid type and even more expensive. Maybe I’ll write about that some other time.

Anyhow, back to the phone. . .

We had a rotary phone with a rotary dial:

 Back in the olden days (yeah I know, people always say that but to me they aren’t really “olden days” but the normal days of my childhood) —

Yes, back then we didn’t have area codes, at least not that I remember. What we had was local calling with certain exchanges that we could call. I don’t really remember long distance calls. They may have existed but I never made any. Not then. Just local calls. When I was little, that meant I could call Middletown or Middletown/Highspire area. That meant I could call Whitney or Webster numbers.

Did I lose you there? Our exchanges weren’t indicated by numbers but by letters. Our phone number started out “Whitney 4” and then progressed to the final four digits. If I wanted to write the number, it would be WH4-****. When I dialed, I’d actually dial 944-****. My friends who lived in either Shopes Gardens or Highspire had Webster numbers: WE9-**** or 939-****. Eventually it changed to all numbers and added an area code, but early on, nope.

Another feature of our early phones: short cords. Yes, these were corded phones with the receiver attached to the base by a coiled and coated wire. If you had a table phone, you sat and talked. A popular piece of furniture then was the gossip bench.

 I didn’t have to go to the internet for that one. That is an actual gossip bench and it’s in my bedroom. Once upon a time it belonged to my great-grandmother and she actually kept her telephone and her phone book and a notepad on it. Notice that for me it holds my alarm clock and a box of tissues and a telephone. It also usually has a stack of clothing waiting for mending or altering but I moved that before I snapped the photo. Notice the wires, for both the alarm clock and the telephone. Yes, I know — most people use their I-phones for both purposes, alarm and phone. But I don’t have an I-phone. I still have a land line.

 Even that phone — purchased within the past five years — is close to antique. I also have a cell phone of sorts. Recently I’ve progressed from a TracFone to a Go-Phone. I even turn it on now and then.

Ok, so my phones are ancient. However, when I was growing up, I thought that old rotary was quite modern. After all, when I watched Lassie, they only had phones like this:

Or this:

        Seriously, at least we could dial direct instead of saying, “Becky can you connect me with the Smiths?”

And another aspect of phones back in the good old days: party lines. We were on the same line as a family down the street. At times that could be inconvenient. Pick up the phone and there was someone already on it, so that meant a wait until that call was done. Or I’d be on the phone and there would be pick-ups and hang-ups, getting progressively more angry until the person would break in and irately demand that I’d get off the phone. The good part? If you picked up the phone quietly and were careful not to breathe too loudly, you could listen in.

However, party lines aren’t all that far in the past. When we moved to Juniata County, we were on a four-party line. That’s right — when my kids were little, we had a party line.

Of course, that was in the past. Today I hate phones. Really. And I hate that they seem to be taking over everywhere I go. Which is probably why I still have a land line: I can walk out of my apartment and leave it behind.