For the Record – Jan. 15, 2015
Thank you firefighters …
Through the years, I’ve seen many times how valuable volunteer fire company services are to communities and the people who live in them. And, there have been instances where my family has had the need for those services. For me the most recent instance was two weeks ago on that icy Saturday night, when three fire companies, Chapman, Renovo and South Renovo, answered my 911 call. My kitchen filled with smoke and the alarms in three rooms sounded, including the security system alarm. I had a frozen dinner in the oven and a piece of toast in the toaster. I thought the smoke was coming from the oven. It wasn’t. I began pulling plugs, including the one for the toaster but I didn’t check it. Much of the smoke appeared up around the light fixture on the ceiling; I called 911. About the same time the security company called me and the communications center. I was advised to leave the house. Within minutes the first fire truck arrived and others followed shortly after. A fireman checked appliances, discovered the warm toaster and burnt bread and removed it from the house. I was extremely fortunate; I did not have a fire. I felt really silly. At the same time I realized how quickly and easily an emergency situation can arise.
Where did the time go? …
Recently I got together with an old friend who I hadn’t seen in 28 years. We were going to go to lunch, but stopped to shop and talk for a few minutes. In no time at all, three hours had gone by and neither of us knew where the time had gone. And what was really neat about it, is that our conversation was just like picking up from yesteryear. Only now, the children we were talking about were our grandchildren who were adults – our ages when we met at a weekly dance. She lived in Atglen. I lived in Gap. She went to Octorara School. I went to Pequea Valley. But we danced to the same music and at the same fire halls on Friday nights. In those years we talked about dancing, boys, music, boys, clothing – bobby socks, poodle skirts and crinoline slips which we traded back and forth among ourselves, and of course, boys. Not much has changed. These days we talk about boys, our sons and grandsons, and girls, our daughters and granddaughters. And we still talk about clothing. Only now it’s support hose and half inch heels. We live too far from each other to trade clothes these days. We miss our dances but still listen to rock and roll. We wonder, where the years have gone, how the time has flown by so quickly.
Telephone booth …
A laptop or Tablet are necessities for today’s students and many of today’s jobs, but it hasn’t been all that terribly long ago when they were mere projections of the future. My real introduction to computers on the job was with an early version of the laptops we use to today, a model made by Texas Instruments. I was explaining to my brother how during my early reporter days when I was sent on a story I had a Texas Instrument lap top of sorts that I would type my notes into, then go to a telephone booth and plug into a jack to transmit the story to the city desk at the newspaper. “What’s a telephone booth?” my brother asked.
We both laughed, he’s not that much younger than me, it occurred to us that many youth of today’s generation might have never heard about telephone booths and probably has never made a call from one. I’m trying to recall the last telephone booth in use in Renovo. Is it, or was it at Yesterdays?
