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Alright, I know a lot of you have been waiting for this post. It was only a matter of time.

A rant on cell phones.

First, try really hard to think back to the time right before everyone had a cell phone. Bill Clinton was president. "Seinfeld" was cleaning up at the Emmys. Super Nintendo was the newest video game system. Your wardrobe consisted of B.U.M. Equipment shirts and stirrup leggings. Life was simple then. And if you're my age, cell phones didn't become truly ubiquitous until about freshman year of high school. I got my first cell phone in the 8th grade and had to share it with my brother Danny, and we only really used it when one of us was going somewhere and we needed to be picked up by mom later.

What did people DO without cell phones? Well, here are a few of my recollections:

1. When you needed to be picked up from somewhere (if you were too young to drive/didn't take a bike or skateboard or rollerblades or....) you'd call your parents Collect on a pay phone. Just dial down the middle, remember? 1-800-C-A-L-L-A-T-T. Then when the lady would leave 2 seconds for you to say your name, you'd say "It's-Lisa-come-pick-us-up-at-*wherever*-please" before they could cut you off. And of course nobody ever accepted the charges because you got really good at talking fast and saying only the vital information. A free and easy way to communicate while abroad. I'd like to take this time to thank AT&T for years of free payphone service.

2. You had to actually make plans ahead of time and stick to those plans. It's ridiculous how being late has become acceptable these days, all because you can send a quick text to someone who's waiting for you saying you'll be there in x amount of minutes, you're running late (which always ends up being way longer, but that's the substance of another rant). Before cell phones, if someone didn't show up on time, it was called being "stood up" and the consequences were far greater, so people took being on time a bit more seriously.

3. You actually had to use your brain to figure things out. Now, if you don't already know, I'm a huge dissident of smart phones. My cell phone only has the capacity to send/receive calls and texts. And that's all I want it to do. I like to keep my technologies separate. I'll go on my computer at home if I want to use the Internet. I'll break out the old fashioned board game if I want to play Scrabble (yes, I just took a jab at Words With Friends). It's amazing how dependent people have become upon the nifty gadgets on their smartphones. For example, there are few of us left who can navigate new surroundings, or even know how to read an old-fashioned map (that's right folks, on actual paper with a key and legend and everything). And then when technology fails, which it always will at some time or another, most are left dumbfounded and pissed off. Smartphones are even affecting memory capacity. All the information we used to store in our brains so we could have it whenever and wherever we are is now stored in smartphones (thanks to cloud computing) which are, you guessed it, whenever and wherever we are.

4. You actually had to get to know people's families. Remember when the only way you could get ahold of your friends was by calling their house? It was rare if that person actually picked up, so you'd end up having to chit-chat for a while with their parents or siblings. This provided good practice in developing respectful manners and for parents it also meant that you knew the kind of crowds with whom your kid was fraternizing. It was a pretty rare thing that a kid had their own phone line. Now that even 2nd graders have cell phones, how many kids do you think actually have to call their friends and get through that familial first wall of communication before actually talking to them? Cell phones are only contributing to their social wuss-dom. These kids don't have to experience the gut-wrenching anxiety that goes into calling someone they have a crush on, and having to talk to their whole family first (as if just calling them wasn't bad enough!). Or on the flipside, having a boy (or girl for you fellas) call your house and subsequently your whole family knowing your dating life or being taunted by your big brothers as they jump to conclusions! Furthermore, they don't even call anymore. They hide behind their screens and just text. Wimps.

5. And my personal favorite rant: you actually had to give your full attention to the person with whom you were hanging out. Perhaps my biggest pet peeve on this entire planet is when I am with a group of people and half of them are looking down at their cell phones at any given time, texting away. Or even worse if you are having quality time with someone 1 on 1 and they stop listening to what you're saying, or stop what they're saying MID SENTENCE to text, or in extreme cases answer a call. I'm sorry, is my company not worthy of your full attention? Am I boring you to tears? Would you rather be having a root canal than a conversation with me? Oh, then by all means talk to someone else! To me, this is the ultimate rudest form of an interruption, and the scary thing is that it's quickly becoming more and more socially acceptable. The funny thing is I think I'm the only one under the age of 40 (that demographic who lived over half their lives without cell phones and did just fine) who finds this deplorable.

Cell phones are certainly not without their benefits, and I'm not trying to lead a worldwide cell phone burning by any means. All I'm saying is this: let's not lose sight of the importance of our inherent human instinctual capacities and basic social manners in this world of frighteningly swift technological advancement.

To wrap this up, I'm going to issue a challenge to my readers (all 3 of you... hi mom!):

Leave your cell phone at home for just one segment of your day, anywhere from 3 hours to the entire time the sun is up. Treat it like a housephone (you know, those archaic wiry things that used to be connected to the wall). At the end of the day I would LOVE to hear how your experience went, all your thoughts/emotions, whether you felt liberated or naked, had anxiety attacks because you felt like you were missing out on everything, etc.

Just do me a favor and don't text or call me or e-mail me with your findings when you're in the company of others.

Can you live without a cell phone?