When I was quite young, my family had one of the first telephones
in our neighborhood. I remember well the polished oak case fastened
to the wall on the lower stair landing. The shiny receiver hung on the
side of the box. I even remembered the number: 105.
I was too little to reach the telephone, but I used to listen with
fascination when my mother talked into it. Once she lifted
me up to speak to my father, who was away on business. Magic! Then
I discovered that somewhere inside that wonderful device lived
an amazing person — her name was “Information Please,“ and there was
nothing that she did not know. My mother could ask her for anybody’s
number and when our clock ran down, Information Please immediately
supplied the correct time.
My first personal experience with this genie-in-the-receiver came one
day while my mother was visiting a neighbor. Amusing myself at the tool
bench in the basement, I whacked my finger with a hammer. The pain was
terrible, but there didn’t seem to be much use crying because there was
no one home to offer sympathy. I walked around the house sucking
my throbbing finger, finally arriving at the stairway. The telephone!
Quickly, I ran for the footstool in the parlor and dragged it to the
landing. Climbing up, 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 fingerrr-“ 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 at home but me,” I blubbered. “Are
you bleeding?“ ”No,” I replied. “I hit it with the hammer, and
it hurts.” ”Can you open your icebox?“ she asked. I said I could. ”Then
chip off a little piece of ice, and hold it on your finger. That will
stop the hurt. Be careful when you use the ice pick,“ she admonished.
“And don’t cry. You’ll be all right.”
After that, I called Information Please for everything. I asked for
help with my Geography, and she told me where Philadelphia was, and the
Orinoco — the romantic river I was going to explore when I grew up. She
helped me with my Arithmetic, and she told me that a pet chipmunk —
I had caught him in the park just that day before — would eat fruits and
nuts. And there was the time that Petey, our pet canary, died. I called
Information Please and told her the sad story. She listened, then said
the usual things grown-up say to soothe a child. But I was unconsoled.
Why was it that birds should sing so beautifully and bring joy to whole
families, only to end as a heap of feathers feet up, on the bottom
of a cage? She must have sensed my deep concern, for she quietly said,
”Paul, always remember that there are other worlds to sing in.“ Somehow,
I felt better.
Another day I was at the telephone. ”Information," said the now
familiar voice. “How do you spell fix?” “F-I-X.“ At that instant,
my sister, who took unholy joy in scaring me, jumped off the stairs
at me with a banshee shriek: ”Yaaaaaaaaaa!” I fell off the stool,
pulling the receiver out of the box by its roots. We were both
terrified — Information Please was no longer there, and I was not at all
sure that I hadn’t hurt her when I pulled the receiver out. Minutes
later, there was a man on the porch. “I’m a telephone repairman. I was
working down the street, and the operator said there might be some
trouble at this number.” He reached for the receiver in my hand. “What
happened?“ I told him. ”Well, we can fix that in a minute or two.“
He opened the telephone box, exposing a maze of wires and coils, and
fiddled for a while with the end of the receiver cord, tightened things
with a small screwdriver. He jiggled the hook up and down a few times,
then spoke into the phone. “Hi, this is Pete. Everything’s under control
at 105. The kid’s sister scared him, and he pulled the cord out of the
box.” He hung up, smiled, gave me a pat on the head, and walked out the
door.
All this took place in a small town in the Pacific Northwest. Then,
when I was nine years old, we moved across the country to Boston — and I
missed my mentor acutely. Information Please belonged in that old
wooden box back at home, and I somehow never thought of trying the tall,
skinny, new phone that sat on the small table in the hall. Yet, as I
grew into my teens, the memories of those childhood conversations never
really left me; often in moments of doubt and perplexity, I would recall
the serene sense of security I had when I knew that I could call
Information Please and get the right answer. I appreciated now how very
patient, understanding, and kind she was to have wasted her time
on a little boy.
A few years later, on my way back to college, my plane put down
in Seattle. I had about half an hour between plan connections, and I
spent 15 minutes or so on the phone with my sister who lived there now,
happily mellowed by marriage and motherhood. Then, really without
thinking what I was doing, I dialed my hometown operator and said,
”Information Please.“ Miraculously, I heard again the small, clear voice
that I know so well: ”Information.” I hadn’t planned this, but I heard
myself saying, “Could you tell me, please, how to spell the word ’fix’?”
There was a long pause. Then came the softly spoken answer. “I guess,“
said Information Please, ”that your finger must have healed by now.”
I laughed. “So it’s really still you. I wonder if you have any idea how
much you meant to me during all that time....” “I wonder,“ she replied,
”if you know how much you meant to me? I never had any children, and I
used to look forward to your calls. Silly, wasn’t it?“ It didn’t seem
silly, but I didn’t say so. Instead, I told her how often I had thought
of her over the years, and I asked if I could call her again when I came
back to visit my sister when the semester was over. “Please do. Just
ask for Sally.” ”Goodbye, Sally.“ It sounded strange for Information
Please to have a name. ”If I run into any chipmunks, I’ll tell them
to eat fruits and nuts.“ “Do that,” she said. “And I expect one of these
days you’ll be off for the Orinoco. Well, good-bye.“
Just three months later, I was back again at the Seattle airport.
A different voice answered, ”Information,” and I asked for Sally. “Are
you a friend?” ”Yes,“ I said. ”An old friend.“ “Then I’m sorry to have
to tell you. Sally had only been working part-time in the last few years
because she was ill. She died five weeks ago.” But before I could
hang up, she said, ”Wait a minute. Did you say your name was Villard?“
”Yes." “Well, Sally left a message for you. She wrote it down.” “What
was it?“ I asked, almost knowing in advance what it would be. ”Here
it is, I’ll read it — Tell him I still say there are other worlds to sing in. He’ll know what I mean.’”
I thanked her and hung up. I did know what Sally meant.
Author
Paul Villard
