Looking out my Backdoor: Two Longs and a Short

It hung in the kitchen in the house in which we lived, on a farm outside New Winchester, Indiana, the first telephone of my memory, a wooden oak box which hung rather high on the wall. My Dad took down the ear piece which hung onto the right side of the box, connected by a short cord and leaned toward the black Bakelite cone and shouted into the mouthpiece in the center front. He turned the handle on the right a few turns.

A grinding noise alerted the operator that somebody wanted to be connected, either on our line or the dreaded long distance.

Our ring was two longs and a short. Every ring on our line was distinct so we knew whom of our neighbors was receiving a call. We also knew when a neighbor picked up their earpiece to listen in to our calls. Precursor to Facebook.

In our next house, on a farm between Laconia and Elizabeth in the Ohio River hills, we had the traditional black Bakelite office-type phone. Easy to use. Those old phones lasted forever, never had to be replaced. Same party line. Same nosey neighbors.

Then the Princess phone emerged, a product of imaginative style and merciless marketing, and everyone had to, just had to, have one.

Oh, yes, the dreaded long distance. Even in his later years, my Dad seldom called me, several states away, unless somebody in the family or a close neighbor had died.

We used a telephone judiciously, when necessary, with forethought. A telephone was a tool.

We’ve come a long way, baby. Today a telephone is seldom used to talk to another person. It is a data processing machine, implanted into one’s palm, to be replaced annually, and if contacting another actual person, we don’t talk, we text. Or less. Send an incomprehensible, to me, emoji, eliminating the necessity for actual words. Amazing, that!

Dinosaur that I am, texting, along with other social media, mystifies me. People can be whomever you want them to be, until you meet them. We tell ourselves these stories. As long as we don’t actually talk, really talk, to the other person, we can keep building our stories.

I digress. What started me on this line of thought about telephones was fear. Fear that I would lose my land line in my move. Dinosaur, remember. I like a land line. They are still handy for some few things, at least, here in Mexico.

When I’m on a telephone, I picture you on the other end, know your voice, your facial expressions, your body language. I feel connected, even long distance.

Ana, Michelle, Crin and I drove to Tequila to the regional Telmex office, each of us with a wish. We each have learned not to become too invested in our wishes. After two hours of face-to-face conversation with the lovely woman in the Telmex office, we left the office with smiles on our faces.

All of this is with Ana’s good help as interpreter, negotiator, and conveyer of our wants.

Crin will have wi-fi service at her house, without having to piggyback onto one of ours. What you must understand that for years different people here have tried and failed to get a line.

Ana got to cancel a service she no longer needed.

She and Michelle got to upgrade another service that they use.

I get to take my account with me and, if the planets are lined up right, retain my same phone number at my new house, even though it is in a different town. Another unheard of, unimaginable impossibility, to move a service 10 K up the road to a different town and retain the same number. Impossible.

Cue the woo-woo music here. We felt as if we slipped into a parallel universe, and in a business office, no less! I’d understand if it were through the back of a wardrobe, perhaps in company with a lion and a witch. Perhaps, oh, never mind.

The challenge will be to stay inside this magical place while four different technicians show up with work orders to make the changes. Might happen. Might not happen.

After a short drive back into the real world, in the center of the city by the Plaza, we ate bang-up excellent meals at a lovely and expensive restaurant in Tequila. We did, however, leave the tequila in Tequila.

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Sondra Ashton grew up in Harlem but spent most of her adult life out of state. She returned to see the Hi-Line with a perspective of delight. After several years back in Harlem, Ashton is seeking new experiences in Etzatlan, Mexico. Once a Montanan, always. Read Ashton’s essays and other work at http://montanatumbleweed.blogspot.com/. Email [email protected].