Cell Phone Blues

Whatever did we do before the invention of the cell phone? I asked myself that this morning as I was driving around frantically trying to find my own. One of my co-workers has a Blackberry, a personal cell phone, and a TRIO provided by her job. I looked at her one day and said, "Dang, do you have enough communication gadgets?" She laughed as she packed her three toys in her pocketbook and said, "I have to have to have all three of these wherever I go. If I leave my house without one of them, it's like getting dressed and forgetting to put on my underwear." I laughed at that and remarked, "Is it really that serious?" She seemed to think so. Well, last night I discovered that it really is that serious.

If you read my last post, you know that I went to my cousin's engagement party in Maryland this weekend. My brother rented a cream-colored 2008 Ford 300 for the trip. I drove to Maryland and he drove back to Philly. We brought an extra person, my aunt, back with us. After my brother drove me to my car (which was parked in front of his house), my wife, my aunt, and I departed. I dropped my aunt off at her house and then, me and my wife went home. It was the end to a perfect day or so I thought...

As I walked in the house, I reached for my cell phone. I always check my messages when I get home because I have my phone on low or vibrate most of the time and I sometimes miss calls and messages. Guess what... my cell phone holder was there but, no cell phone. I thought, "Oh, it's on the porch somewhere." I used my wife's cell phone to call myself... nothing. I went out to my car with a flashlight and searched under the seats, in the trunk, etc. Nothing. I drove frantically around to my aunt's block thinking it was around there. Still nothing! Sadly, I came home.

You know what I did? I prayed. Yeah, God wants us to pray about everything, even the little stupid things we do that we feel we can handle and are too minor "to take up His time with." I sent up one of those "bullet prayers" that brother SLC talks about. Then, I called the lounge in Maryland. It was around 1:00am and there were still some people in the club cleaning up. They said that they hadn't found a cell phone.

I then called my brother and he looked in the car and didn't find it. I was beginning to think that I would have to go to my provider first thing in the morning and have them cancel my phone and get a new phone. I really didn't relish the hassle of having to do that plus, having to call all of my friends and ask them to e-mail me their phone numbers to load into my phone.

By now, it was about 2:00am so, do you know what I did? I sat down at my computer and started blogging. I went to "Escapades " and wrote the final two installments for my missing person's mystery, "Dead Man Walking" and "Love Is A Losing Game". It relaxed me and around 3:30am, I went to sleep. (What did we do before blogging?-lol)

All night long I thought about my cell phone and all of my phone numbers, unread text messages, and what have you. Obsessive-compulsive that I am, I got up at 8:00am, showered, put on some clothes, got in my car, and drove to my brother's house. And, there it was... my cell phone was lying in the grass in front of his house. He couldn't have seen it last night because it was dark and plus, it wasn't in the car, it was lying in the grass. Yes, God does answer prayers.

I wiped the morning dew off of it, called my wife to let her know that I had found it, and then proceeded to go and get some much needed coffee. What a fuss I made over a gadget... My friend didn't seem so funny now with her Trio, Blackberry, and cell phone fetish. Seems like it wasn't that long ago that the only way you could catch me was if I was at home or you saw me on the street. Times were so much simpler then...

(For Brother SLC, Sister Keisha "Kitten" Isaacs, Little Sis Shanita Waters, and Sister Stayce.)