Aunty Acid by Ged Backland for August 08, 2023

sigh sweet ol’ days

And I’m old enough to remember party lines.

I remember not having a phone and Mother having to go upstairs to our landlady to use hers.

I remember not even having push buttons on my phone.

That’s one of them new fangled touchtone phones.

Did you know any dinosaurs personally, Aunty?

I remember the dial phones and wondering why when you needed to call the police or fire department you had to dial the operator and that was the 0 which took the longest to dial.

I remember not being able to use the phone if you were expecting a call because you’d miss the call.

And call waiting was when you dialed and YOU got a busy signal.

Now, since I live in a rural area, I just go home to avoid calls I’m expecting. :)

And having a 20’ cord so you could walk around while talking

Our phone number had letters in it, no area codes, and long distance calls required an operator.

I remember in the earlier days of cell phones being popular, I was waiting at a movie theater for some friends. I called them when they were late for 3 separate showings (5 to 10 minutes apart) and they kept saying that one was on the phone. The last time, I asked if it was a cell phone and if so, to GET HIM IN THE CAR.

There was still the attitude that that you needed to stay where you were if you got a call. This, of course, was partly because of the frequency of dropped calls but partly because old habits die hard..

Aunty, your so old……

How old is she?

Aunty is so old that she remembers staying home when she was expecting a clay tablet written in cuneiform.

Aunty is so old that she has hieroglyphics on your driver’s license.

Aunty is so old that the key on Ben Franklin’s kite was to her apartment.

Aunty is so old when she was young, rainbows were black and white.

Aunty is so old she has a personally autographed copy of the Bible.

Aunty is so old that when she was born the Dead Sea was just sick.

I remember two soup cans and a string. So, there!

I remember one phone per household and everyone having to share it. Whoever made the call, paid for it. I was very unhappy when with early cell phones both people had to pay. I didn’t see the fairness in that. Now most of us have unlimited calls. I remember having friends who lived just a few miles away but were “long distance” and we couldn’t talk on the phone often. I also remember fondly the days when I didn’t have to listen to everyone’s doctor appointment details while they talk on the phone on speaker as loud as they can and people playing electronic games without turning the sound off in public. I came very, very close to suggesting to one woman that we were trying to eat, and if she needed to discuss gynecological and elimination problems with her friend on speaker, maybe she should do that outside or at a later time. I so wanted to do that. The whole rest of the restaurant was quiet. Maybe in shock. I kept thinking the call would end – it went on about 45 minutes. We could hear both sides. The whole restaurant could hear both sides. Probably even the cooks.

I’m old enough to remember ‘the answering machine filled up, you take notes’

I’m old enough to remember when our rural area did not even have telephone lines nor electric lines. The sticks were a step above us.

Well, at least you demonstrated a push button phone so the kids wouldn’t get totally confused with that little steering wheel on the big black phone case thing.

Way back then the receiver was so heavy one couldn’t stay on the line for more than a few minutes. Gave my arms cramps (talking to boys and besties can be very long, involved conversations)!

Me too.

We used to know the operator by her first name.

I still take calls at home. I don’t like to speak on my mobile to somebody else than my husband. And I don’t want to be called while driving the car or being grocery shopping or at the doctors. So only very few people get the number of my mobile phone. I may be old fashioned about that.

I am surprised it is showing touch-tone. I have faint memories of the phone company having to come to the house because the phones were hardwired into the house. Those were round. We got touch-tone in the late 70s. I remember when I was 10 my sister got a Snoopy and Woodstock phone for her place. That was the first time I’d ever seen a phone you didn’t need a technician for.

i’m so old i can remember being tormented for months by a demented stalker who called my phone 24/7 (i began to wonder when this maniac ever slept…) and not receiving any assistance from NTT, the phone monopoly of the time, now known as docomo, because it would “infringe the caller’s privacy.” yup. this wack job was doing things like having pizzas delivered (but never before i’d finished lunch, sadly) and at one point a bed from a department store, and the phone company was worried about that person’s privacy. i wasn’t getting any sleep unless i unplugged my phone and the phone company didn’t want to bother the stalker…

time moves on, and today there are laws to protect people against that kind of crime…

Good ole days.