We live a two-bedroom, two-bath condo, coming in at 1223 sq. feet. I mention this because we have 4 landlines, plus 2 smartphones. This means that at about every two feet, give or take, you are going to fall over a phone. This plethora of phones wasn’t by design, but happenstance. When you shop at Costco, you are going to find exorbitant amounts of anything and everything. So it is with phones. For about a dollar, give or take, you, too, can get your hands on a set of 4 or 5 landlines including the answering machine.

I mention all of this because one of our cordless, landline phones has gone missing. We’ve instituted a search and come up with nothing. Where has the little darling gone? What could have happened to it? Did it run away from home? When we ring it, there’s no reply. After a certain amount of days, if it’s not recharged the batteries run down. But before it dies, it comes to life screaming to be reattached to its mother-stand. This can be extremely unnerving the first few times it happens. But this time, nothing. No screaming. No phone.

These days when the phones ring, and I reached out from wherever I am, there seems to be no phone but an empty stand. I find we are moving the 3 remaining phones around depending on where we are, which as I mentioned, is about 2 feet apart from one another. Now instead of taking 1 ring to answer the phone, it can take me up to 3! We should have bought the 5-phone set.