While sometime the phone would ring
Just as we were sitting down to eat
Or telling a bedtime story
Or trying to get out the door
Or drifting off to sleep,
There was a comfort in being
Reachable
By those who needed to reach us
And in whose reach we wanted to be.
But now, the unsteady dial tone is gone.
The earful of static has gone silent.
The landline, she is dead.
And verily, we might mourn,
Then let her rest in peace,
Survived by the cell phones.
But we need our DSL
As an academic needs her coffee*
(Or as a twentyish Objectivist needs his Rush CD),
And so we wait
For the phone company guy
To break up the concrete
And perform the bypass surgery
That will connect us again
To the system of tubes
That feels like home.
*I have absolutely no idea why this simile would occur to me. Well, aside from the fact that I’m using the wifi at a coffee house where they are currently roasting coffee beans.
Outstanding! Especially topical, as we discussed this very topic recently at OUR household.
Please keep us posted if regrets / problems crop up.
I just wanted to let you know that that put a huge smile on my face.
How odd to think that there is a generation being raised now of which a large percentage will have never known a home land line.
I hate it when my landline phone dies because it means I am out of touch with my Mum who lives in England. I know I could use my cellphone to call her, but it is so expensive.
I hope you get reconnected soon.
Wait, isn’t DSL a satellite, not a phone, service? (I honestly don’t know; I use cable broadband.)
Welcome to the wonderful world of deteriorating infrastructure, where short term thinking is holy writ and long term planning is anathema.
<Python>I’m not dead yet. I feel healthy!</Python>
Land line may be dead as far as the technically elite are concerned (and yes, I’m one of them), but many poorer and older households (and every single business I’m aware of that isn’t based out of someone’s home) are still being caretakers for it. I don’t mind burying the land line, but let’s wait until it’s truly dead, OK?
P.S. I’m also getting tired of the IM generation and their older admirers proclaiming that e-mail is dead when it so clearly isn’t, and is, in fact, powering the world’s businesses, as well as most (many?) households.
Wolfganger, to be clear, I am not calling the landline obsolete. Rather, I am noting that the landline that is supposed to deliver phone service and DSL does not work. And until they come and break up some concrete and replace the faulty stretch of line, I can’t log on to the internet from home.
I’m not dealing with it very well.
*I have absolutely no idea why this simile would occur to me. Well, aside from the fact that I’m using the wifi at a coffee house where they are currently roasting coffee beans.
DSL and coffee both speed transit through the tubes…
“I’m not dealing with it very well.”
Don’t they have a 12-step or somthin’ for that???
This is great! (The poem, that is – the lack of connectivity’s a bummer.)
We’re thinking about getting rid of the landline (our internet is cable) and just going with our cell phones, but I like the feeling of being reachable, as you put it, by those who need to reach us.