A simple phone call

I was not at school with this man, and neither were we at University together. I did not know him during our separate times in the army, and he always played at a higher level on the sports fields of our journeys. He married a close friend of mine, and although I did attend his 21st birthday party, the memories of that are hazy at best, and any recollections of that quite magnificent evening should not grace these pages.

It was a toga party. I will stop right there.

Our daughters are the same age, at different schools now, and as firm friends they have a close relationship – except when trying to drown each other in the Water Polo pool, and as so often happens in our lives, we just never get to see each other enough. Life happens, our paths cross from time to time, and we remain friends – even on the side of the pool where are daughters engage in a form of Navy Seal underwater combat. If Quentin Tarantino ever directed a sports movie, it would be centered around Water Polo, and the majority of the scenes would be around the dark, underhand and brutal art of life in The Hole.

With no school sports and fewer social engagements during this Covid world, we have hardly seen each other at all, and when the phone rang on my way to golf, it felt like nothing had changed.

There was the same laughing voice, an adult life time of memories, and a re-establishment of relationship. He had phoned simply because he had thought of me, and in those few moments, I felt connected again. I felt connected to a world bigger than the one I was currently in. I felt connected to a network of people who I have missed, and connected again to my past.

It was a simple call to make, and an even simpler one to receive, but I was struck again by the profundity of small acts, and while his wife is a top Doctor, I enjoyed the medicine he gave me for free.

I have always thought there is an inverse relationship between cell phones and physical distance. The further away we are physically, the more useful the cell phone, and the closer we are in proximity, the more obsolete it becomes.

Perhaps that relationship between cell phone and distance is also paradoxical. The closer we are – even at dinner tables, the more we use it, and the further we are away from each other, the more we forget to drop others a line.

I do this myself. Disconnect from my family by picking up my phone in the middle of a conversation, and then not calling my Mom for a week.

While it may be a step too far to expect a simple phone call between the Ex and present President of the US, I wonder if it wouldn’t go some way to achieving a far more united world with less polarization and more collaboration?

Of course, it is lovely to get a text, an SMS or a WhatsApp, but another sense is activated with a call. We get to hear the voice, and much like good jokes and great speeches, conversations are always better in the delivery than they are in print.

Maybe the one thing which holds us back from making these calls, is the unwritten obligation they carry in that perhaps now we need to listen. And listening is tough. We get prizes at school for great speaking, but none for good listening, and yet, to quote David Oxberg:

“Being listened to is so close to being loved, that most people cannot tell the difference.”

Phoning is an act of friendship.

Listening is an act of love.

Who will you phone today?

Steve Hall