Monday, July 23, 2007

Obituary of My Phone

This post is in lament of our phones. The Guy and I were both devoted to our ancient (or so they seem), cheap (relatively – his, at least, mine would qualify in absolute terms) mobile phones. We were determined to not abandon them for (read: too cheap to spend money on) newer versions. Add to that the fact that we used those phones during our courtship period and they therefore have a bit of sentimental value (not to speak of old SMSes) attached.

And then, one day, mine starts shutting itself down for no reason, at various times. Till it shut down completely. It underwent a long stint at the service centre, with little improvement. Never mind, I said. We don’t need three phones. We should do perfectly well with one mobile and one landline. Let’s shut down one connection. Given the fact that I have grown to think of phones as as much of a nuisance as a convenience, it wasn't a painful decision to make.

Then the other phone, worn out with many tumbles, falls, and knocks, has taken to disintegrating itself at the slightest provocation. Picture putting the phone to your ear to answer a call and having a piece of it fall at your feet. We’ve even taken to carrying it around without one of its not-so-vital parts, and telling ourselves that it looks prettier that way.


With my mom paying us a long visit, we could depend on her phone whenever either of ours was too difficult to handle. Then she left. She had used her hometown phone connection all the months she was here, and it worked fine even when in her stopover in Delhi. It was only when she finally reached her hometown that her phone stopped working. It would have been truly ironic if it was due to a problem in the connection, but it turned out to be a problem in the phone. Do phones get contagious diseases?

As for us - sooner rather than later, we’ll have to drag our lazy selves to the store and select a new one. Sigh.

5 comments:

Masood said...

Very well written :)
It took me well over 2 yrs to get rid of mine for a newer one (all that was left of it was bits n pieces but i still have it around!)
Infact your guy n me, we bought our phones on the same day! Ofcourse I started using mine before he did. He had to wait for abt a month to get his hands on his cell!
As you are aware, i changed mine a couple of months back! :(
Why is it so hard?!!
Totally agree with you when you say sentimental value!!

SeeTina said...

This is hillarious, cuz i cant bring myself to get a new phone either... esp as in some circles i am getting a reputation of being technologically backward.. lol

Unmana said...

Masood: It's sad, isn't it? They don't seem to make things to last these days! Also, there's something wrong with us - I remember there was a time when I used to look forward to a new phone... Now nothing seems to beat the comfort associated with my old one. I doubt it will revive, however!

Contemplator: But I consider your phone quite nice. Look at the pic I put up of ours!

Rohini said...

The biggest inertia for shifting phones is the exercise of copying numbers from the old one to the new one. What a pain!

Unmana said...

Rohini: Hey, thanks for visiting!