.KEYWORD editorial1098
.FLYINGHEAD FROM THE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
.TITLE Make an impression
.DEPT
.SUMMARY A friend sent us a wonderful story via email. Normally, we wouldn’t just reprint a story from an anonymous writer received over email, but this one is pretty special and we wanted to share it with you all. In his monthly editorial, Editor-in-Chief David Gewirtz shares this warm-hearted, uplifting story and relates it to the Palm experience.
.AUTHOR David Gewirtz
A friend of mine sent me a wonderful story via email. Normally, I wouldn’t just reprint a story by an anonymous writer I received over email as my editorial, but this one is pretty special and I wanted to share it with you all. Read it, and then we’ll talk some more…
.H1 Impressions, by "Paul"
When I was quite young, my father had one of the first telephones in our neighborhood. I remember well 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 used to talk 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 anybody’s number and the correct time.
My first personal experience with this genie-in-the-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 didn’t seem to be any reason 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?"
"No," I replied. "I hit my finger with the hammer and it hurts."
"Can you open your icebox?" she asked.
I said I could.
"Then chip off a little piece 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 fruits and nuts.
Then, there was the time Petey, our pet canary died. I called "Information Please" and told her the sad story. She listened, then said the usual things grown-ups say to soothe a child. But I was un-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 the now familiar voice.
"How do you spell fix?" I asked.
All this took place in a small town in the Pacific Northwest. When I was 9 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 tall, 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 half an 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 still 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, 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."
"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 I still say there are other worlds to sing in. He’ll know what I mean."
I thanked her and hung up. I knew what Sally meant.
–Anonymous
Moral: Never underestimate the impression you may make on others."
.H1 My thoughts
As I read this, I thought back on names from very long ago, those teachers who helped me grow and thrive, who taught me to think and to appreciate the important things in life. I thought of "Mezz", the person who introduced me to computers back in the days when we used paper tape and toggled programs in on the front panel of an old PDP-8e; of Patricia Demerest, the first English teacher I ever encountered who thought it was perfectly reasonable to write about what I cared about, not just what was doctrine; of Jim Armitage and David Brown, very different professors, but both who helped me learn that thinking and problem solving went way beyond hooking parts together, and of Mrs Burdick, the old librarian who encouraged a young boy’s interest in a wide variety of books.
And then I think of my responsibility. I reach many people (literally hundreds of thousands) with these publications of mine, the books I’ve written, the interviews I’ve done, the courses I’ve taught, and the employees I’ve alternately mentored and tortured. I’ve even reached people in countries I never expect to visit; I’ve been translated into Russian by Radio Free Europe, and I’m told forty other languages by the Voice of America.
I tend to go through life being somewhat cranky if the coffee isn’t made right or the sandwich doesn’t have the right cheese. Last month, I used an entire column to bitch about doing a memory card upgrade.
But you know, sometimes we have to rise above our day-to-day annoyances. Sometimes we just have to do something because it’s uplifting. Normally, I write and publish very hands-on stuff about using computer technology and do interviews on technology trends.
But we’re more than our technology. There really are other worlds to sing in. We can’t hide behind our email messages and stuff our entire lives into the Memo application of our Palm computers. Life is much more than that.
Thanks for letting me make an impression.
.BEGIN_SIDEBAR
.H1 Comments on last month’s column
Apparently I made an impression last month in my column, when I complained about Eudora being "GPF-lovin’". Eudora’s Development Manager, Brian Minear, wrote to tell me about an upgrade from Version 4.0 to Version 4.02, (available at http://www.eudora.com) which he said would eliminate the problems I was having. He was right! Eudora hasn’t crashed on me since. Big thanks to Brian.
.END_SIDEBAR
.BIO
.DISCUSS http://www.component-net.com/webx?13@@.ee6c304
