Just a few minutes ago, I hung up the phone from talking to an old friend of mine, who is currently working out side of London.
When I say ‘hung up’, I meant I touched the screen in my fancy iPhone to turn off the connection we had using FaceTime. We had talked about an hour, regarding the British socialized medical system (she hates it) and why you don’t see much evidence of orthodontics, our dogs and how much they shed or don’t shed (including turning my phone’s camera orientation around so she could see where Ripley and Jake were sleeping), the fancy kitchen that comes with her rented flat and that she only knows how to fry eggs, what train schedule I should take when I visit next month, how to train cats to use doggie doors. Nothing really. And because we already have internet connections, the phone call was essentially…free. Houston to London, for an hour, for free.
More people than I would want to talk to all at once
When I was a young girl, and my dad was in the Air Force, we lived quite a distance from my grandparents. I vaguely remember my mother writing and receiving letters. At one time, we owned one of these:
1960s version of Skype
Our family would talk on the tape, taking turns, and then mail the tape off. We would receive tapes from my grandparents, my grandmother’s familiar voice sounding so “hick” to my ears that had become accustomed to rapid fire nasal voices from California or Montana. There would be frequent additions from my aunts, and sometimes my little cousins. I seemed to remember my long-dead great grandfather singing something, maybe “O My Darling Clementine”. It was a way to keep in touch, because visits were rare and phone calls so expensive that they were saved for Christmas, or death announcements.
My sons have fancy smart phones, but to them, calling is a bother. They prefer to text. Or have me send them a message via their Facebook accounts, because they’ll get a notification. We’ve had a couple conference calls, when I needed to tell them the same information and didn’t want to repeat myself.
Maybe their children will have teleporters.
And visit their mother more often
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Categories: Family, General Stuff!
Two Different Girls 
I remember as a child watching my father ring my grandmother who lived about 4hrs drive from us. It involved calling an operator, requesting a line to her town, and then requesting the number. Now, at 80, he sends his granddaughter (my daughter) emails……I wonder what my daughter will do to communicate with her children and grandchildren……
I remember those tape recorders/players. By, the way I still have that reel with both your great grandfathers singing together in my genealogy keepsakes. Also, a cassette tape of my mother talking about her younger life and family stories.
You need to get those put on a CD, Dianne. Tapes lose their magnetic signal. Eventually all the sound will be gone. They don’t last for decades
I would like to do that, but don’t know how to go about it.