On the phone
I was just talking to my old friend George, whose vehicle broke down in Gulfport, Mississippi. While we talked, he hopped on a bus and went to the waterfront, where he regaled me with descriptions of the persisting ruination. (Even the Coast Guard station has not been rebuilt.) It was like having my own private Ira Glass/NPR. George got quite into it: I was worried that he might be apprehended by the authorities. But whenever he bumped into anyone, his voice shifted over into Good Ole Boy. At one point, he said to someone, "It don't matter tuh me" with an authenticity that completely veiled the fact that he'd just been talking, in model English, about C S Lewis's Screwtape Letters.
At one point, George muttered something about my having other things to do, and I replied that, no, I didn't. That's right, he said, I don't pick up the phone if I have something better to do. In fact, I called him, in response to a text message that he sent to my Gmail address. That's right, George said again: you don't have to worry if my mind is elsewhere when you're talking to me, because I don't stay on the phone just to be nice.
And I thought, is that a good thing or a bad thing? I'd stay on the phone to be nice to someone in a crisis, or suffering a loss. But otherwise, I stay off the phone unless I really want to hear someone's voice.
