Last (Friday) evening, as I was leaving for the Gopher women's hockey game (quick aside and judgement: They could have won 70-0 over St. Cloud St., but they didn't look sharp; they had many moments where they threaded passes in front of the net but either the player wasn't there or she missed on the shot), the phone rang. I ignored it.
I've ignored the home phone a lot lately. In fact, I don't remember the last time I answered it. These days -- shoot, I might as well say the past several years, or at least ever since Grandmother was thrown out of the house -- no one of any importance has called us through the land line. Since we got Caller ID lo those many years ago we've been able to see who exactly is calling, and for nearly every single incoming call we have no idea who it is. Most of the time the call reads "Toll-Free," so I think we could safely say that it's a telemarketer. The only identification I can trace are the calls in the name of my alma mater ... but those are usually work-study students soliciting money from me, so they are telemarketers.
The times I have picked up the phone I often don't hear anyone. It's silence followed, a few seconds later, by a click. At first I thought, "Why the hell did you call me then?" But then I read on National Public Radio that in fact it might be a tactic scammers use. Answering the phone actually is a first step on the way to someone stealing my identity. So, in my mind, the thing I should do (and my parents usually do nowadays) is to ignore the call so that the robo-callers think that there's no one living there anymore, or at least the person living there will be much harder to get bank information from than someone who does pick up.
So I no longer pick up, which is weird. I grew up answering the phone. I mean, if a phone rings, you answer it, don't you? But the land line has become more of a weak point protecting our personal identity than a means of communication; we have our cell phones to communicate instead. So it has become easy to flat out ignore it. Those rings have become white noise; my thoughts are interrupted when I hear the first ring, but thereafter I go about my business. And in the case last (Friday) evening, I have no qualms walking out the door and letting it ring until it wears out.
That brings up one thing that I don't want to think about: If our home phone is useless, why even bother paying for the home phone number anymore? It costs about 35 bucks to have it, but I can't say we're using it at all. But I am very loathe to cut the cord. For one thing, that land line might come in handy in case of emergency. Can't imagine what that would be, but it feels good to have more than one line of communication just in case. The more sentimental reason for me is that we have had this house number for as long as I can remember. I'm sure that we have had it since they moved into this house. It's because a part of our identity, even if it is of no use to us now. Getting rid of that would be getting rid of a part of ... well, me, kind of like losing The Store.
So, I'll continue to waste money on the phone line for the phone number, and I'll be just fine ignoring the phone the only times it makes itself heard.
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