The Phone Saga

It is a well known fact that although attentive in my relationships to other human beings, animals, and growing things, my attention to my own material objects, especially in regards to their whereabouts and well being, is occasionally a tad lax. Jewelry mysteriously vanishes, my keys jump ship, and my cell phones, well, they have had (collectively) a rough life. I have had five phones, which in this day and age is reasonable, but I have not had the four new phones simply out of a desire to own the latest technological gadget. My phones are always the cheapest thing in the Verizon store, and really, all I want them to do is text and call people. Who really needs internet access and a video camera in their pocket? My first phone was innocently in my purse when I dropped said bag into Lake Whinnipesaukee in New Hampshire while in the process of stepping from a dock into a motor boat. For a while, we thought it would revive itself, and it did seem fine, but then it mysteriously stopped allowing my voice to be heard. I could hear whoever was on the other end, but they couldn't hear me. Phone number two was in the same long-strapped purse when is was sadly pulverized as I shut my swinging bag in the passenger side car door. Number three was perhaps the most traumatic experience. I shut it in a front loading washer at Smith and noticed that it was gone a few minutes later. I sat forlornly in front of the washer for an hour watching it go round through the super spin cycle and the heavy duty pulse, etc. Even its long rehab in a bowl of rice to soak up the moisture did not cure it of its ills. You would think that after washing it once I would have been more careful, but no, last week I washed it yet again. Luckily I had a back up which I then submerged in a pool while diving in with all my clothes on. I'm getting a new one tomorrow. We'll see how long it lasts.