In the home of my childhood, there was a little table in the hall. It had a little chair and a little shelf. Inside the little shelf lived an address book - or more properly, what was called a telephone index.
It was metallic grey, and it had a sliding button that cruised the alphabet. Pop it on B, and bingo! Up came the numbers for Babysitter.
In the home of my childhood, one did not sit on the porch to make a call. One did not retire to the privacy of the bedroom or the den. One sat at the telephone table in the hall, and yammered on about this or that - for all in the family to hear.
In the home of my husband's childhood, there was a similar setup. In his case, however, there was no table in the hall, more than likely because there was no hallway.
His telephone station was in the kitchen. The phone was almond, if I recall, and it was attached to a wall just inside the door. It had a black curly cord, which was long enough that you could make your call beside the broom closet if you wished.
My sons would not get this. In the home of their childhood, there were phones in the kitchen, in the TV room and in their parents' bedroom. None of them had a cord.
To the sons, it would be unfathomable to have to sit in one place while speaking to a girlfriend. They would have preferred dental work than a conversation with a special gal within earshot of their mother.
To them, a phone without a camera would be like a TV without a remote or a laptop without a keyboard - nothing short of weird.
So it is that the telephone is evolving still - and in some cases disappearing.
"We don't need our house phone anymore," the husband informed me not long ago.
I gave the statement some thought. I decided he was right.
After all, the only people who call on the phone these days - it's still in the kitchen, the den and our bedroom - are solicitors. Or pollsters. Or people with thick accents who claim that our computer has contracted a virus, which can only be treated if we share credit card information.
The house phone is about to join the hall phone and the wall phone and head where old phones go to die.
No longer need them, not even one. But I'd love a telephone index.
