"Information,
Please!"
I
remember when I thought "Information,
Please" meant you could ask them any question you wanted. Never
tested it out like this boy did ...
When I was quite young,
my father
had one of the first telephones in our neighborhood. I remember
the polished, old case fastened to the wall. The shiny receiver
hung
on the side of the box. I was too little to reach the telephone,
but used to listen with fascination when my mother talked to it.
Then I discovered that
somewhere
inside the wonderful device lived an amazing person. Her name was
"Information, Please" and there was
nothing she did not know. “Information,
Please” could supply anyone's number and the correct time. My
personal experience with the genie-in-a-bottle came one day while my
mother was visiting a neighbor.
Amusing myself at the
tool bench
in the basement, I whacked my finger with a hammer, the pain was
terrible, but there seemed no point in crying because there was no one
home to give sympathy. I walked around the house
sucking my throbbing finger, finally arriving at the stairway.
The telephone!
Quickly, I ran for the
footstool
in the parlor and dragged it to the landing.
Climbing up, I unhooked the receiver in the parlor and held it to my
ear.
"Information, please" I
said into the mouthpiece just above my
head. A click or two and a small clear voice spoke into my ear.
"Information."
"I hurt my finger," I
wailed into the phone, the tears came readily
enough now that I had an
audience. "Isn't your mother home?" came the question.
"Nobody's home but me,"
I blubbered.
"Are you bleeding?" the
voice asked.
"No," I replied. "I hit
my finger with the hammer and it hurts."
"Can you open the
icebox?" she asked. I said I could. "Then
chip off a little bit
of ice and hold it to your finger," said the voice.
After that, I called
"Information, Please" for everything. I
asked her for help with my geography, and she told me where
Philadelphia
was. She helped me with my math. She told me my pet
chipmunk that I had caught in the park just the day before, would eat
fruit and nuts.
Then, there was the time
Petey, our pet canary, died. I called, "Information,
Please," and told her the sad story.
She listened, and then said things grown-ups say to soothe a
child. But I was not consoled. I asked her, "Why is it that
birds should sing so beautifully and bring joy to all families, only to
end
up as a heap of feathers on the bottom of a cage?"
She must have sensed my
deep
concern, for she said quietly, "Paul, always remember that there are
other worlds to sing in."
Somehow I felt better.
Another day I was on the
telephone, "Information, Please."
"Information," said in
the now familiar voice.
"How do I spell fix?" I
asked. All this took place in a small
town in the Pacific Northwest.
When I was nine years
old, we moved across the country to Boston.
I missed my friend very much. "Information, Please" belonged in
that old wooden box back home and I somehow never
thought of trying the shiny new phone that sat on the table in the hall.
As I grew into my teens,
the
memories of those childhood conversations never really left me.
Often, in moments of doubt and perplexity I
would recall the serene sense of security I had then. I
appreciated now
how patient, understanding, and kind she was to have spent her time on
a
little boy.
A few years later, on my
way west
to college, my plane put down in Seattle.
I had about a half-hour or so between planes. I spent 15 minutes
or so on the phone with my sister, who lived
there now. Then without thinking what I
was doing, I dialed my hometown operator and said, "Information,
Please."
Miraculously, I heard
the small, clear voice I knew so well. "Information."
I hadn't planned this,
but I heard myself saying, "Could you please tell me how to spell fix?"
There was a long
pause. Then came the soft spoken answer, "I
guess your finger must have healed by now."
I laughed, "So it's
really you," I said. "I wonder if
you have any idea how much you meant to me during that time?"
I wonder," she said, "if
you know how much your calls meant to me. I never had any
children and I used to look forward to your calls."
I told her how often I
had thought of her over the years and I asked if I could call her again
when I came back to visit my sister.
"Please do", she
said. "Just ask for Sally."
Three months later I was
back in Seattle. A different voice answered,
"Information." I asked for Sally.
"Are you a friend?" she
said.
"Yes, I'm Paul, a very
old friend," I answered.
"I'm sorry to have to
tell you this," she said. "Sally
had been working part-time the last few years because she was sick.
She died five weeks ago."
Before I could hang up
she said, "Wait a minute, did you say your name was Paul?"
"Yes." I answered.
"Well, Sally left a
message for you. She wrote it down in case you called. Let
me read
it to you."
The note said, "Tell him
there are other worlds to sing in.
He'll know what I mean."
I thanked her and hung
up. I knew what Sally meant.
Never underestimate the
impression you may make on others.
Whose life have you
touched today?
Contributed
by
James Odle, Jr.
Defining
Moments
Archives
Copyright
© 2006, Jace Carlton. All International Rights Reserved.
