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Do You Play
Telephone Tag?

ERICA MEYER RAUZIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

I

have four telephones in my
house: an old one, a new one,
a portable one, and one built
into the fax machine.
My husband has a telephone
in his car, but he carries it around
when we go out.
I have a U.S. Mail Service
mailbox in active use, and I'm
about to get computerized E-mail.
Two courier services and three
long-distance package handlers
know me by name, account num-
ber and zip code.
I have a big computer with
many little attachments. I have
a copier in the next room. I know
what a modem is, and I'm not
afraid.
My daughters have computers,
and my son has a walkie-talkie.
We have cable.
We have radio.
We even have CD-ROM.
We are equipped to communi-
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WE'RE FIGHTING FOR YOUR LIFE

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Paris and have it the next morn-
:. ing. Scarcity is a thing of the past.
With just the push of a button,
the Internet will swoop me into
cyperspace in my pajamas.
So why can't I get in touch with
anybody?
My life is telephone tag, com-
puter messaging, answering ma-
chine beeps and blips, scrawled
notes and recorded announce-
ments. I feel like I haven't talked
--to a human being since 1989.
Every morning, I launch my
few calls into the atmosphere and
wait to hear a real voice, not one
of those talking machines where
every syl-a-ble is e-nun-ci-a-ted
clear-ly.
I sit alone at my desk, sur-
rounded with all the companion-
ship microchips can provide. The
desk looks like Barbie died here:
a swirl of little pink shreds of pa-
per:
"Ruth called back, call her.
She'll be in from 3:30 to 3:45."
"Modem a copy of John's fax to
Carole's mailbox."
"Call the doctor's service."
(We've given up on calling the
doctor himself, but sometimes we
can achieve actual contact with
a surly clerk who may or may not
pass the message along.)
"Call the repairman." This one
comes up a lot. Milliotac of rria-

chines generate millions of repair-
persons who drop by to keep the
electronic brethren healthy and
leave with the machines dinging
merrily and their pockets full of
checks.
I figure I'm an adult, and I can
handle this. So what if my most
intimate relationships can only
take place when the rates are
low? So what if even my ma-
chines wel-
c o m e
Sabbath, just
so they can
cool off and
recharge
themselves?
So what if my
answering
device is tak-
ing messages
for my fax, and neither of them
want to show the contents to me?
I can cope. Fm a child of the in-
formation age and this is bread
and butter to my system. Right?
Of course, right.
However, this is tougher on
small children. My pre-teen can
manage. She chases Carmen
Santiago all over the globe and
has traversed the Oregon Trail
frequently via CD-Rom using the
pseudonym Gladys and accom-
panied by two teams of oxen.
Even my middle child can deal:
She plays Tetras on her baby
Macintosh (so old the screen is
only 9 inches square) and writes
her third-grade spelling sen-
tences in seven different ornate
typefaces.
It's the little guy I'm worried
about. He's just turned 5 and he's
tired of simply watching while
the rest of us have all this fun in
the marvelous world of mechan-
ical objects. He is trying to catch
up; he just can't
quite catch on.
He tried phon-
ing his Dad on
the adding ma-
chine; he tried
talking to the microwave; he tried
faxing a crayon drawing via the
copier. He just hasn't matched
task to machine yet, with one ex-
ception.
We all stand in awe, behind
him, our beepers and pagers at
rest, our computer screens dark,
our answering machines silent,
and we watch him, ever so care-
fully, as he grins at us and then
goes back to work: fixing the
VCR. We can talk, but he can
tape.
I asked him to tell me how, and
he said, "Sure. Just beep me any
time." 111