cell phone
As we go through this journey we call life, this world we live in will go through many changes. As I was looking at old family pictures, and it got me thinking about what a change it must have been to go from the horse and buggy days to the automobile. My grandfather and my Uncle Ted (back seat right two people) I’m quite sure grew up with the idea that cars were going to be around, but my great grandfather (back left) must have been quite in awe over the changes going on in his life. I remember the first time I drove a car, but I had ridden in a car many times by that time, and they were commonplace items. I just can’t imagine seeing a car for the first time as an adult, but that is what so many of our ancestors did. Bob’s grandmother talked often of the changes from a horse and buggy to the car.
When I was a kid, a computer took up an entire room, and nobody had one in their home. 
Then came the PC, and people started buying them. Pretty soon everyone had one in their house. Now there are laptops, netbooks, tablets, and even smart phones. I remember too, when the only phones that existed where in a building or the occasional telephone booth…remember those. Telephone booths almost don’t exist anymore, because we all have a phone in our purse or pocket, and most of them are smart phones now, so we can even access the internet with them.
So many changes have taken place in in the past 200 years alone, that our ancestors would not even know this place if they could see it. I have to wonder how much of it would absolutely terrify them, if they could step into our time. And what would our thoughts be if we could step back into the old West? Back to the days when the harvesting was done with a horse and wagon, and it took a large group of 
people to get the job done. Hay was cut down using scythes and loaded in the wagon using rakes and a pitchfork. That was a much harder time in our history, and the harvest wasn’t taken so much for granted. School was planned around it, because the kids were needed to help with the harvest too.
Sometimes, I think we all need to look back in time once in a while, and really see how very blessed we are to be living in a time where much of our work is easy, food is abundant, travel is quick, and staying in touch with people all over the world is a normal, everyday event.
A number of years ago, my sister, Cheryl had several friends who got together as often as possible for coffee at what was then the Ramada Inn. They would sit and talk for hours, but it would seem like such a short time to them. They were having such a good time. They talked about their lives and kids, and hopes and dreams…just whatever came to their minds. It was girls’ night, before girls’ night became so popular.
Now, in those days, there was no such thing as a cell phone, so when people were not at home, they were not easy to get a hold of. And when the girls got to talking…well, lets just say they weren’t worried about being found. Everyone knew where they were anyway. The guys, however, thought it was somewhat like a bunch of hens, clucking along.
Nevertheless, sometimes you needed to be able to get a hold of people…not that it was any emergency or anything, but it might have been, so it just made sense. I suppose that is why cell phones were invented…you are never out of touch with a cell phone. But, that invention would not come for a few years yet, so if anyone needed to get a hold of Cheryl when she was having coffee with her friends, they had to call the Ramada and have her paged. They knew her, so they always went to her table to get her, without paging her.
One time however, was a little different. My brother-in-law had a plan…and he was pretty good at those plans. He didn’t need anything when he called the Ramada, he just wanted to try something. So he called the Ramada, and asked them to bring Cheryl to the phone. Now as I said, Chris had a plan, so when they paged my sister, this is what she heard. “Telephone call for…Marathon Masterson!” Well, you can just imagine her shock when she heard that being said. She knew it was aimed at her, and it was now a nickname she would carry around for many years to come.
