jamie doom

*Your cry for help, in the form of this call, has gone unnoticed yet again. I hope you won’t do anything foolish with that Drano and those darvasets until I call you back.

*Maybe I’ll never know what it was you wanted to say to me on this cold gray day in December. Maybe, it will remain one of those heart-wrenching mysteries that accompany my tired bones to the grave. But hopefully you’ll hear this recorded message and sense my earnestness and something inside you will decide not to let that happen.

*Honestly, I am able to come to the phone right now, so I’m not even going to go through the sad motions of pretending that I really wanted to talk to you. Obviously, if I had wanted to talk to you, come hell or high water, I would have. You can be sure of that. So basically the purpose of this message is to let you know that you aren’t really my friend, and it’s foolish for us to even pretend anymore. Leave a message at the beep

*When was it, as the civilized, that we stopped talking face to face? When did we sell the birthright of daily human communion for the mess of porridge called convenience? When did Nokias replace social grace? Leave a message, sheep.

*Inexplicably, while you were using your thumb to find my name in the address book of your phone, I was walking outside and hooking up the hose, and gently spraying my gardenias and humming an old English hymn. All the time a wry smile was beginning to creep onto my face. So if you want to ruin my bliss, keep calling me.

*If the social and psychological stress of leaving a properly worded message is too difficult for you to bear, I will try to understand and abide it. I will try not to see your name in the queue of missed calls and wonder why, oh why, you called but did not leave of message.

*Obviously this isn’t working out. You keep calling it “phone tag”…like your flippancy won’t add to my anguish…like this is some type of fun game…us seeking desperately…but never quite actually…talking to each other. So if you have reached this message, it’s because I am standing on a very large bridge contemplating which to heave from its cold, hard railing. Myself or the Nokia?

*Life, as it often does, has played another one of its cruel tricks. For you have called at entirely the wrong time. For, regretfully, I am detained or perhaps otherwise engaged and either cannot or will not answer the phone. But do not lose heart fair caller, for I shall call you back in the bye and bye. Fair thee well.