Channel Surfing Blog 

Kelly Teal

A few days ago I returned home from one of the best vacations ever. Why the best? Two reasons: a) My husband and I, along with a couple of friends, rode our motorcycles to and from southeastern Colorado, via northern Arizona, near the Grand Canyon’s North Rim; b) My Verizon cell service was spotty at best.

The latter fact initially upset me. I had zero bars our first night away, at Jacob Lake, and darn it, I am used to having my electronic communications available. Besides, Verizon touts itself as providing coverage everywhere – “It’s the Network” and “No Dead Zones,” right? To top it off, our friend Pete uses Alltel (which Verizon is buying, perhaps for this reason) and had perfect reception.

But it only took me a few minutes to appreciate that having no cell service, and just a couple of bars when I did, meant something divine: my network was sitting on the cabin balcony with me, drinking beer, telling stories, relaxing in the pines.

Too often we forgo essential human interaction in favor of the cold screen, the spare black type that conveys neither inflection nor body language. Thank you, Verizon, for failing me. For the first time in a while, I was forced to withdraw from my electronic network and revel in the purely human network. Which is what communications – and communication – are about in the first place.