CADIZ! PICK. UP. YOUR. PHONE. PICK UP YOUR PHONE WHEN WE CALL YOU. PICK IT UP. PICK IT UP! PICK UP YOUR PHONE!
While this person is a close friend whom I love very much, I couldn't help but bristle. Sure, it was the third in a series of unanswered calls about making plans for meeting up tomorrow night, but DUDE
a) While most of those calls were placed, I was in my parents' back yard about 16 feet up in a tree picking cherries with my father
b) I was incapable of hearing the phone
c) Even if i did hear it, I wasn't about to climb down to answer it
d) I had already planned to return the earlier call I missed, you know, when I got down out of the tree and washed the cherry juice off my hands.
This is the type of incident--very similar to situations when I'm in the bathroom taking care of business and hear the phone ring, hear the house phone ring directly afterward, and then hear my cell phone ring again, all within two minutes--when one thing is abundantly clear:
I AM NOT GOING TO ANSWER THE PHONE RIGHT THEN NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES YOU CALL ME.
Back in the day, I was the first to have a cellphone. However, it was one I was not allowed to use outside of emergencies or to inform my mother that I didn't end up in a three-car pileup on I-57 on the way back to college (yet somehow I still forgot and constantly got in big trouble). It was also one that took up almost half of my automobile's glove compartment. In terms of getting a minute-racking cellphone I could use to actually converse with my friends, I was the last to get one of those. And even though I withstood a lot of exasperated pleas to get myself into the new century, making that leap gave me great pause. Because frankly, I do not like to be trackable.
This mentality probably stems from Mickey Mouse Tie giving me a hot-pink pager in high school and demanding to know why it took me 20 minutes to call back when I was in class. His homing tactics went on to include driving three hours to sit outside my college dormitory and interrogate my friends, who feigned ignorance about how I was sneaking into the building through the the back basement laundry room as they spoke. I believe that pager ended up at the bottom of a lake, to be joined by the relationship shortly thereafter.
Maybe this is why I don't risk neck breakage to answer the phone. And often when I get non-message calls, I assume they are shooting-the shit type timefillers and don't always call back. (Btw, I do not buy into the b.s. reason, "you should see 'missed call' and call me back." Also, the house phone is strictly reserved for telemarketers or blood banks seeking donations.) Nope. Today's lesson kids, is: Leave a message and maybe I'll call you back.
If you want some sweet cherries, that is.
The bounty. This, largest mixing bowl has a 13-inch diameter and a 6-inch depth. (sorry a little blurry)
The artsy shot.
yummmyyyyyy!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteyeah i got my parents a cellphone for the same reason- to call me for emergencies- my dad said: why? if we are having an emergency... what could you do? get there before the cops? no.. so phone is a waste of money!
sometimes i wish i was like them
Cherry pie, mmm. My brother has mulberry...I pick and eat, pick and eat, straight from the tree.
ReplyDeleteWhen I lived alone in another country, I had a friend who used to do this to me with the phone...no matter where I was or what I was doing, she expected me to leave off, break neck, rush to answer.
When I finally did get to the phone, she'd be ANGRY that I didn't answer her earlier calls.
Your phone etiquette makes perfect sense to me. Who was the person said we're all susceptible to the "tyranny of the urgent," and that it's not a good thing? Yeah.
ReplyDelete... I want cherries.
The cherries look awesome AND answering the phone can definitely wait!!!! People need to learn patience sometimes....
ReplyDeleteI have a cell phone and it is almost never on. This is because I subscribe to the view that if I am not already talking to you, I don't want to be talking to you. If I was awaiting an organ donation or something, I'd change my tune. But until that time, leave a message and leave me alone, callers. Sheesh!
ReplyDeleteThat's why I waited so long to get a cell phone. I wanted to have the "I was out" excuse. Now those days are gone, we have to be more clever with our excuses. Like "I was 16 feet up in a tree picking cherries..." ;)
ReplyDeleteI've never been one of those people that was proud of not having a cell phone. On the contrary, I couldn't wait to get one. I couldn't wait to have the option of calling anyone I needed to at pretty much any time. I was so happy that never again would I have to use a public phone, or try and figure out how to get help if my car broke down somewhere... Nope, I love my phone. And while I don't like being harassed in the manner you mentioned, I have absolutely no qualms with using the caller ID and screening calls as I see fit. But, nobody I know has ever demanded that I answer the phone... so maybe I don't have a point.
ReplyDeleteBut the "artsy shot" looks fantastic :)
wow, that totally sounds like a text I would have sent you back in the day when I was a chicagoan. i side with the texter, and not the textee - cherry picking or not.
ReplyDeletehad i been cherry pickin', cotton pickin', or just plain pickin' my nose, my cell phone would have been in my pocket, readily accessible. shame on you cadiz!
Mickey Mouse tie sounds hilarious, I just gotta say.
ReplyDeleteLovely cherries, and I'm so with you on the phone thing. That's what voicemail is for. We still need the space to sometimes not be reachable.
ReplyDeleteI'm totally drooling over those cherries. I can't wait until we have some of our own.
ReplyDelete