I resisted buying a mobile phone for years, mostly because of the expense, and partly because my dad had worked for Ma Bell. Owning a cell seemed not only to be an extravagance, but also a betrayal of the land-line monopoly that had put food in my mouth all those years. But after the 9/11 attacks, I got a pay-per-use phone. And a few months before I became The Poppa, I added myself to the big-carrier plan that my wife had been using for awhile.
But throughout the late 1990s, before mobile-phone ownership was an inevitability, I harbored a deeper objection. I never read Into Thin Air, but one of the book's widely disseminated plot-points -- the final satellite call by Everest guide Rob Hall to his wife during that disastrous 1996 climb -- firmly affected my view of personal communications devices. Now, I've never trekked up a big mountain. And I've never been hopelessly lost in the wilderness. But I've also never been enamored with the idea of having the ability to call home and say, hey baby, I'm freezing my balls off and things don't look too good. In that kind of situation, if you have a phone, you're kinda obligated to use it, even though it's probably gonna be one of those conversations that is more "ironic and awful" than "dramatically sweet."
So, back in the day, anytime I borrowed somebody's celly for a long trip or whatever, I thought about Hall. And since I've owned my own, this has been my plan: If know I'm going to die, and I'm able to use my phone, I'll just send a text message to my entire address book:
LUV U ALL!
Everybody will think it's flippant and/or cavalier, but after awhile, they'll be appreciative that I even made the effort. (I reserve the right to revise this plan, depending on the context.)
It's possible that I'll send a second txt to close friends and family:
LUV U LOTS!
And Tha Mrs. will be all like "WTF?" And then I'll txt her:
BALLS FREEZING OFF. DOESN'T LOOK GOOD. LUV U MOST!!!!
And I'll be a legendary coward.
(read the complete and ongoing Secret History here)
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