Wordy Rappinghood

Not only is today's title one of my fav club songs of the early 80's but it also reminds me of a phone call I had, this morning. I have a good friend that I don't get to talk to nearly enough. Our hours never seem to coincide. She is always running out the door in the mornings and I am always crazy in the evenings. We do try to make time to talk once or twice a month and when we do, it's a marathon of talking. We know that it will be a few weeks until we talk, again, so we each need to make sure that we get all details covered.

In my ever changing moods, I realize that I am of an age where I really like to get old school phone calls on my old school landline. I like looking at the caller id and seeing that it is a good friend that I do not get to talk to as often as I would like. Today, when I viewed that she was calling, I got an instant smile on my face.

Do you have someone that calls you that instantly puts you in a good mood? A talky, talky mood? Do you have someone that calls and shares good times, sad times, worried times, frustrating times and gossip times? It's the best kind of phone call. We have known each other for a number of years. We both have daughters the same age and we are able to reassure each other that our daughter is not from another planet and no, we really are not losing our minds. We can laugh about things in life, we can help each other through worried times...and we have each had our worried times, we have cried over losses and shared notes on the usual suspects around town that we both find amusing and loathe at the same time. Our conversations can run really long or just long enough for the other to report in on something we just know will make the other one laugh.

We try to have periodic coffee dates but the phone is our usual choice of visiting. It's easy, it doesn't require leaving the house on a busy day and we know that we each have the other's undivided attention as we begin our conversation dance. We are both avid and fast talkers. So, a long time ago, we learned how to do this conversation dance so that we did not seem rude as we continued to cut off a sentence to jump to the next topic or sentence. It's a dance that only comes with time and familiarity and fondness. If neither of us are in a rush, we have lengthy conversations. If one of us is rushed, the other picks up on it and we do a speeedy run through of the condensed version of what's been happening. We know how to get to the most important stuff, let the other comment/laugh/gasp, move on and then hang up. It's the dance of friendship and conversation and the lost art of actually talking, not texting, on a phone.

When I hang up with her or any of my old school friends that still use landline phones, I am struck at how comforted I feel. It takes me back to when the family rotary phone hung in our kitchen when I was growing up. To have any privacy, you had to lock yourself in the kitchen pantry. You developed the conversation dance way back then. You knew people were lurking outside the pantry door so you had to be stealth like in what you said, outloud, what you silently implied and what you faked your way through in code talk. AKA code to throw your mother off on the fact that you were planning to travel out of town to a forbidden concert but making her think you were going to hang with said friend and have a sleepover at said friend's house. We were masters at this conversation dance.

Those days are long gone and I don't have to speak in code, I rarely get landline calls and if I want to travel out of town to a concert, I don't have to have a code. So, when my phone rings and it's a good friend, I know to grab a cup of coffee, settle in, and start the dance of conversation with a friend.