Information Please

When I was quite young, I discovered that somewhere inside the telephone - an amazing person called 'Information Please' and there was nothing she did not know. Information Please could supply anybody's number at the correct time.

 

The beginning of my friendship was one day when 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! I unhooked the receiver 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, but it hurts bad" I replied. "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."

 

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, and she told me my pet chipmunk I had caught in the park just the day before would eat fruits and nuts.

 

Another day I was on the telephone. "Information Please." "Information," said the now familiar voice. "How do you spell fix?" I asked.

 

Then 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 hall table.

 

Yet as I grew into my teens, the memories of those childhood conversations and that strange bond of friendship 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, and somehow without thinking what I was doing, I dialed my hometown operator and said, "Information Please".

 

Miraculously, I heard again the small, clear voice I knew so well, "Information." I hadn't planned this but I heard myself saying, "Could you tell me please how-to spell fix?'

 

There was a long pause. Then came the soft spoken answer, "I guess that 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."

 

We all touch each other in many ways and friendships develop between the most unexpected and unlikely people. Keep an eye out for one of these unexpected but enriching relationships.