By Gary Schindler
Buffalo, NY – Just imagine it, the drone of the jet engines, 4 hours elbow to elbow with 186 of your closest strangers... and they're all talking on their cell phones.
This scene, which Dante would have included in one of the lower layers of hell if he were writing the Inferno today, is coming soon to an airplane around you.
A Qualcomm's Wireless Systems executive is quoted as saying, "It's only a matter of time before we have cellphones on planes." By 2007 at the latest. Two years from now, three at the maximum. Given the fact that the struggling airlines will be able to generate revenue from in flight phone calls, since cellphones don't work at altitudes over 10,000 feet, you can bet the push is on.
There is still the lingering fear that cell phone use may result in plane crashes. Still, after several hours of a "Yeah, Uh huh, what, Really?, no way!" symphony, dropping from the sky at terminal velocity might seem a sane and reasonable wish.
For me, the ability to use a cell phone does nor make make traveling at hundreds of miles an hour at an altitude of 37,000 feet in a confining aluminum tube with stale recirculated air more attractive. Nay, on the contrary, it will but increase the anguish.
I am not an anti-technology wacko. I have been spotted hunched over my PDA in public places by the geek patrol. I have high speed cable internet access. I have even gone over to the dark side posses a cell phone.
Our family got a cell phone years ago, a whopper bigger than your average lunchbox and weighing about 8 pounds. I discovered that "mobile" is a relative term.
Yes, I have a cell phone, and when I have to, I use it. I have the plan that the phone companies don't want to sell you. Five calls a week is for me high volume.
I am tired of hearing calls in the mall that apparently have no content and no reason for happening except the fact that two people have phones and they can talk!
I am offended by having to listen to a detailed phone conversation about someone's Aunt who is having surgery and will now need health products advertised on television. Product advertisements that should never be seen, especially during dinner.
I was astonished one day to hear voices while in my office, and upon investigation found that I was hearing one half of a phone conversation. What I heard was an angry woman TALKING VERY LOUDLY on the sidewalk next to the street, about 120 feet away the closed front door of my church.
There is less and less chance in our world to, as Elijah did in the First Book of Kings, hear the still small voice of God, or anybody else's voice for that matter. We're way too busy looking for the next call. Maybe that will be the big thing. Maybe it will be the call with the big break, the new account, the potential fianc , the notification that you have won the lottery. More likely it is someone calling to ask if you can pick up a quart of milk on the way home; or a wrong number.
What will you be missing in the cacophony of phone calls on a plane? Relative peace and quiet? A chance to sit and think uninterrupted? An opportunity to meet a really interesting someone sitting right next to you? A chance to just be? Maybe God is calling: and God doesn't use a cell phone.
Listener-Commentator Gary Schindler is pastor of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Springville.