Tethered

I walk the dogs in the morning, I walk the dogs in the afternoon and I walk the dogs in the evening. Sometimes they're more than an hour walk and sometimes they're about 20 to 30 minutes. Each and every time, though, I feel naked if I don't bring my cell phone along with me.

Not that I cannot be without my phone. I think it has more to do with watching Law & Order franchises and other crime dramas. It's not that I cannot be untethered from my phone it's that feeling that Murphy's Laws will take the reigns and that one time I'm without contact to the police or other emergency services I'm going to need to call for help or to report something.

That feeling kind of annoys me. Didn't we all, well most of us all, used to live without cell phones? Didn't we used to have to walk or run to the nearest phone when an emergency occurred? I remember in the late 90s (pre cell phone) when I was walking near my mother's house in Florida when I noticed across a canal a fire consuming a tree. I had to run to the nearest house, knock on the door and hope someone answered before I could dial 911. When the old lady finally did answer she wouldn't dial 911 but instead handed the phone's handset through the small gap she left between the door and the house.

How much damage happened and how far could that fire have spread had I been able to dial 911 right away instead of wasting 10 minutes or so finding a phone?

And then there's the other side of the coin. I like to walk when I talk. Don't ask me why, I just do. If I'm on the phone with anyone I am most like walking around. These days I'll put the dog on leash and go for a walk, but in pre-cell days I'd walk around the house in the limited range of cordless phones and (gasp!) clean the house.

Anywho, I hate the idea of being tethered to my cellphone and yet the idea of not having it available annoys me even more.