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Opinion
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Wednesday, 28 July 2010 08:00 |
I grew up in a generation that has witnessed the greatest explosion of communications the world has ever known.
As a youngster, we had a large wooden telephone mounted on the wall with a receiver that hung on the side of the phone, and the speaker was fastened in the middle of the telephone. You cranked the ringer on the side several times in order to talk with a live operator who asked, “Number please?” You gave her the number, and in my small home town, numbers were easy to remember. Our home phone number was “41”. The operator would then ring the number you asked for, and if someone was at home, they picked up their receiver and the conversation could begin.
Some of us had party lines instead of private lines. The operator would ring your designated number of rings; like a long and one short or a short and two longs. Every phone on the party line would ring, and if you wanted to, you could pick up your receiver and listen to the conversation between your neighbors. If you wanted privacy, you had to verbally tell them “hang up” or “get off the line.”
I was always fascinated with the telephone office since two of my sisters worked as operators. They would occasionally let me watch them work, and it was amazing how they would connect the calling party to his requested number. They had to know every number in town and move up and down the old switch board.
When the old wooden phone came off the wall and was replaced by a black ceramic desk telephone that had speaker and receiver in one piece and rested in a cradle on top of the phone, we all thought technology had gone too far. You even had to dial a seven digit number, and no one but the operator could listen to your conversation. Those of us who lived during this time still use the term “dial a phone,” and no one dials a phone anymore.
I took typing in high school because someone said you will need this if you’re going to college. We learned on manual typewriters. That’s all we had back then. When you came to the end of the line you were typing, you threw your carriage to return to the specified line of type.
What a marvelous invention. Throwing carriages was one of the best times we boys had in typing class. I will never forget the last time I really threw a carriage in typing. A contest had broken out among us boys, and it was to see who could throw first and hardest. Augie Beckman won when he threw his typewriter off his desk and on to the floor.
I used a typewriter considerably in my early years as a teacher, and it wasn’t until I was a principal that computers came into existence. Little did I realize computers would become a communications tool. When we first started teaching computers, they were for businesses only, and the language the computer used was what the students learned, and they were more for reading punch cards than communicating. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would be using a computer, and here I am using my typing skills to write this column, and I haven’t once thrown my carriage or machine on the floor.
I must say, however, that I have reached a saturation point with all this technology. The cell phone does far more than I want from a telephone. I will admit they are handy to have, and they eliminate the need to locate a telephone booth if you’re on the road. But I don’t need to have at my finger tips a set of encyclopedias, or an atlas, nor do I need to have at my disposal the entire Internet. I recently sat next to a lady on an airplane, and she had loaded on to her cell phone four movies. She proceeded to watch one using her cell phone, and she listened with ear phones. I just slept.
My grandchildren are encouraging me to sign up for Twitter and Facebook, so they can communicate more readily with me in the modern way. They have even scolded me because I don’t have texting capabilities on my cell phone. I enjoy talking verbally to a human being, not reading poorly spelled words on a micro screen.
I was considering a Facebook page, but when I realized having such a page meant hanging your face out there for every idiot in the world to send you a message, I suddenly decided I didn’t want my face on my computer. And as for twittering, that’s what birds do!
I really miss the old wooden telephone and a nice operator to talk to if you felt lonely and needed someone to listen. |
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Opinion
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Wednesday, 21 July 2010 08:00 |
Dear Editor,
Early Tuesday afternoon was a beautiful, just slightly cloudy day after a series of dark, rainy days. It seemed to be a perfect day for me to take my niece and nephew to Lake Miola outside of Paola to go swimming and play in the water. Their ages are 10 and 6, and they were very excited to go on our little outing. Unfortunately, their fun was ruined after only 45 minutes of swimming by the inappropriate behavior of other lake visitors.
The thing that has me the most appalled is the fact that the behavior was coming from the adults at the lake that day. The first occurrence happened when the two siblings were playing in the water with another brother and sister that they knew from school. The two women with these children were speaking so inappropriately that even I had to gasp at some of the phrases.
I quietly asked my niece and nephew to play on the other side of the swimming area and apologized that they would no longer be able to play with their young friends that day. Not even 10 minutes later, after the children had moved to another area, I looked up to check on them and saw an adult couple embracing each other in the water and necking and making out. This was only a few yards from where my niece and nephew were playing. Again, absolutely disgusted by the things that these children were being exposed to at a public lake, I stood and asked the kids to get out of the water.
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Opinion
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Wednesday, 21 July 2010 08:00 |
Baby-sitting has come a long way from when neighborhood girls did the job. Today, businesses have sprung up complete with playgrounds within fences and beds for each child. The hourly rate has gone from a few cents to enough to pay Social Security and vacation time for all employees.
I know this because our daughter has to have such a service. She wants her mother to “sit” one day a week so her infant daughter will bond with grandma. Our daughter still has to pay the regular sitter for the day my granddaughter doesn’t come to her business. Last week, the sitter was taking a long weekend as part of her vacation time, and our daughter had to pay the sitter even though she didn’t sit with our granddaughter.
Even though we find this outrageous, we still play the role of doting grandparents. And we enjoy every minute of it. One day a week we keep both of our son’s children; a 3-year-old girl and a 10-month-old boy. They enjoy coming to the farm.
While here, we keep them really busy. My converted golf cart whisks them to the neighboring dairy and to the neighbors who raise sheep and horses, and who happen to have a goat and miniature pig. My wife’s oldest granddaughter has been making this weekly sojourn to the farm since she was six months old. Her newest granddaughter is seven months old and is now making her weekly trip to the farm.
We have been witness to the unbelievable growth of a youngster. When we had our own children, we were both so busy working and trying to care for them that the enjoyment of watching a child develop was lost to us. Now we spend an entire day with each set of grandchildren and do nothing but play with them and watch them develop.
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Opinion
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Wednesday, 21 July 2010 08:00 |
Miami County has a reputation for having a strong presence of war veterans, and it once again proved true over the weekend.
Veterans from across Kansas, who are members of the Forty & Eight, gathered in Paola on Saturday for a state meeting of the organization. Paola residents should be honored the group chose to meet here, considering the closest Forty & Eight voiture is located in Johnson County.
Thanks to the efforts of Paola veterans like Carl Gregg, who is the Chef de Gare of Voiture 1510 out of Johnson County, the group decided Paola would be the best place for their state meeting.
National Forty & Eight member Preston Olson told his fellow members Saturday that Miami County has a strong presence of veterans, and he hopes Gregg soon will be joined in the organization by several other Miami County war heroes. He even said Paola may someday get its own voiture.
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