Thirty-six Hours of Squirming …

Johnny-on-the-Spot … by John Foster …

Is your life run by a device that is about 6 inches long and 3.5 inches wide?

I don’t know that my life is run by that 21 square inch piece of equipment but when I couldn’t account for its’ whereabouts for roughly a day and a half, my life got a bit more complicated.

My wife, oldest daughter and I went to breakfast the other morning and as we waited for our food, we were discussing the properties of corned beef hash and pickled cucumbers.

I dug my cellphone out of my pants pocket and was searching for answers when breakfast arrived.

I put the phone aside and we ate.

When we got home, I realized I didn’t have my cellphone in that familiar left front pocket of my jeans.

I assumed I had left my communication equipment in the booth of the restaurant we just left.

I returned to the scene of the “crime” but no phone had been turned in to the staff.

But I received assurances that the staff would o a much closer look after they closed for the day and call me us they found something.

The next morning I went to work with an empty left front pocket but I planned to call the eatery where I last recalled having my phone.

I swung by mid-morning but the restaurant staff said there was no cellphone located.

I resigned myself to the fact that someone had “found” it and decided to assume new ownership.

My wife and I started the process to determine our options.

Did you ever go to a cellphone website and look for a simple answer to your problem?

Fat chance.

We also dug out the box with all the paperwork from our original phone purchases about 2 years ago.

While attempting to see if we could “locate” our phone electronically, we did discover we had coverage for a lost or stolen device and we could take steps to see that a misappropriated phone could be shut down to prevent unauthorized use.

I’m calling key folks with my wife’s phone to give them her number to contact me while we kept pawing through websites and paperwork, searching for answers.

Meanwhile, a new phone purchase was looking more and more likely.

I’m thinking, “All those phone numbers and pictures and my beloved Word Cookies game!” when my wife suggested calling our breakfast buddy from the morning before to see if she could check her cars’ backseat for my phone.

After all, I didn’t drive and took the backseat to allow my gals to occupy the front ones.

Guess what?

My cellphone wound up going to school that day with my daughter.

It evidently fell out of my coat pocket and onto the seat on the ride home after breakfast.

Black phones blend in real well with charcoal grey car seats.

Whew!

I obviously didn’t remember picking up my phone and stashing it in my coat pocket when we finished breakfast.

My phone was back and my wife and I are still married.

But, I gotta tell you this was one of those times I wish the industrial-looking black phone that hung on the kitchen wall in my childhood home was still the way to communicate today.

I wouldn’t have left that unit on the backseat of my daughter’s car.

It couldn’t fall out of a coat pocket.

You could barely cover it with a coat.

It’s made me revisit this cellphone business.

First of all, I don’t do that much talking on it.

Lots of texting.

Checking weather radar.

Sports scores.

News headlines.

Taking pictures.

But talking on the phone?

Not so much.

I grew up in the age of party lines and mastered the arm of lifting the receiver deftly and release the buttons to so I could hear the conversation taking place.

But that phone was always there.

Couldn’t play games on it or listen to music unless you dialed a bar with a live band playing, but you could always call someone.

It never got misplaced.

You could always find it.

It never moved!

It was anchored to the wall.

I even used one of those old “bag phones”.

By the time you stuck the magnetic-based antenna outside and untangled the cord and dialed properly, you could drive to get the answer.

But it didn’t fall out of your pocket.

I fully expect my wife to “Super Glue” my cellphone to my left hand while I’m sleeping.