I COULDN’T believe I’d actually done it. But I had.
And there was nothing I could do, lest embark upon an impractical, arduous four-mile round trip to rectify the situation, collecting my home alone phone off the kitchen table.
Heading disconsolately for the supermarket, I felt like a cowboy without a gun, repeatedly reaching for my pocket like I was in a quick-draw competition. Panic immediately set in. What if daughters, Lindsay and Laura, rang? Or my other half, Dawn?
Moreover, what cataclysmic events was I missing on social media? And then there was notifications to think about. News reports. Fitness alerts. The Reds’ hot gossip transfer news I’d been waiting for.
Ah, the addictive curse of mobile phones. If we needed a phone in days of yore, it would mean a date with a red-painted box.
On Wombwell High Street, there was a trio of boxes located side by side on a tiny plot of land between the Coop and Post Office.
Climb on the slats of the adjacent wooden bench and you’d enjoy unrivalled views over the valley, taking in the churning winding gear of Darfield Main, dominating the landscape alongside a mountainous colliery pit-stack and busy-busy, industrial railway line.
Lengthy queues would form outside, making it excruciatingly uncomfortable for people speaking long distance to friends and relatives – especially when folk grew impatient to the point where they would start tapping on the window. People would sometimes assemble for incoming calls at prearranged times.
If we happened to be walking past and the phone rang, we’d be on it in a flash, pretending it was a wrong number.
“Burgin’s fish and chips. Can I help…?”
In order to make a call, you needed the right denomination of coins. As such, it was commonplace to be stopped in the street and asked for change.
People always tried to oblige one other in this respect and would pause whatever it was they were doing, delving in pockets, wallets or purses, carefully counting out silver and brown soap.
“A florin’s change, owd cock? That shouldn’t be a problem. There tha goes, look: two tanners, a couple of threepenny bits, five pennies and two halfpennies…”
Of ironwork construction with a sturdy concrete base and emblazoned with the British Crown up top, boxes were conspicuous by a latticework of graffiti laden windows on three sides. Stale and rancid, a well-thumbed directory hogged the shelf beneath the handset, missing pages often necessitating a call to the operator to obtain a number. Callers would insert coins before dialling out, pressing button A to speak or button B for a refund if no-one answered. Sometimes, callers might phone dial-a-disc, fast moving chart toppers played in loop, or occasionally the weather forecast or ever so polite speaking clock.
“At the third stroke, it will be two-twenty-five and twenty seconds…”
We are where we are, however, and mobile phones are now an intrinsic part of everyday life, boasting a multitude of seemingly indispensable uses. Users can pay for shopping or nights out. Check and update banking. Generate route maps, play music and games, plus so much more. Given chance, I doubt there’s many who would forego the mini-computer in their pocket. Imagine if we did, though, waking to the clamour of a real alarm clock.
Having to put the telly on to catch the news. Buying a paper for the football scores, or needing to step outside to ascertain the weather.
People everywhere are eternally scrolling. On buses. Trains. At work and in the pub. Even walking down the street. People with stooped postures, fingers and thumbs working overtime, constructing an endless round of emails, text messages and especially social media guff. Dinner pics. Holiday snaps.
Feeling concerned at the hospital posts, twinned by inevitable replies of: what’s up, hun? Immediately followed by: I’ve pm’d you. Sharing a lost dog in Birmingham post. No, not the West Midlands: Birmingham flipping Alabama, like the missing mutt is going to hop aboard Virgin Atlantic, alight at Manchester, traverse Woodhead Pass and randomly turn up in the car park of Grimethorpe WMC.
Ps, I’ve recently deleted all my German mobile phone contacts.
Yup, it’s Hans-free…
