South Dakota Flight & Cell Phones

Tomorrow we’re flying out of Phoenix Sky Harbor for a really short trip to South Dakota for the interment of my brother’s ashes. He died last December and was cremated, but wanted his ashes to be buried in the family plot along with his first wife and their young son, both of whom were killed almost fifty years ago in a tragic plane crash. So, nearly the entire Travis clan is converging on this tiny prairie town, Mobridge, SD, for the service. It’s really more about a reunion and a celebration than a funeral, as I’m sure my brother would like it to be. I’m the last sibling, but with all the nephews and cousins and kids and their kids and grandkids, we should add up to nearly seventy. And it will very likely be the last time we see most of them. One final get-together before we say our last farewell to our old hometown, our last goodbye to most of the people in attendance. Just another of the doors that must be closed before mine and Rosalie’s doors close. But that won't happen for many years to come . . . I hope.

I’m still trying to figure out all the elements of our new cell phones. One thing I didn’t know: that even when turned off, a cell phone can still wake itself to ring out a set alarm. Just to see if I knew what I was doing, I went to the alarm setting and set it to ring at 4:00 a.m. That’s what time we need to get up for our 7:00 flight out of Phoenix tomorrow, but I had set it a day ahead of time. When we went to bed last night, I made sure my phone was turned off. At 4:00 a.m. I heard a phone ringing in the living room, ringing fifteen times. I counted them off. Went back to sleep, thinking the wakeup was over. Nah. At 4:05 it did it again . . . and again at 4:10, at which time I stomped out to the living room, turned the phone off, put it in the back room, went back to bed. At 4:15 and 4:20 and 4:25 and 4:30 I could hear the distant, subdued ringing. At 4:35, as I lay there waiting, there was only blessed silence. The phone got tired of trying to get me up. Now I know better than to use it as an alarm clock. I wonder how many other things about my new phone will try to drive me crazy. I don’t have all that far to go . . . to crazy, that is.