"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." ~Arthur C. Clarke

As a little girl growing up in the 70's, we had two telephones in our house on Clinton Street.  A beige wall phone hung over the counter in the kitchen, and a blue princess phone adorned the nightstand in my parents' bedroom.  They looked exactly like these...

 

 

I can still see my mother sitting in a kitchen chair talking to Granny or Aunt Sadie Mae on that beige phone.  Sometimes when talking to Aunt Sadie Mae, my mother would put the phone receiver down on the table, leaving Aunt Sadie Mae talking to the air while Mom put clothes in the dryer, or unloaded the dishwasher.  When Mom returned and picked up the phone, Aunt Sadie never knew she had left.  I also remember how the phone would ring and my brother and I would race to see who could get to it first, arguing all the way about who got to answer it the last time it rang!

As I got older, sometimes I would talk on the phone to my friends, and of course when I did that I would always go in my parents' bedroom to use the blue princess phone - I had more privacy that way.  But what was really exciting was that when I reached my teen years, my daddy put a phone jack in MY bedroom, and I got THIS...

And it was a push-button instead of a rotary dial!  I was definitely moving up in the world!

Technology has come a long way.  Back in the 70's, it never occurred to me that I might one day be able to carry my phone with me wherever I went, nor that it would do things like text messaging and have games on it!  If you had shown my 13-year-old self an iPhone, I would've thought it was magic!

Jeff is traveling with work this week, and last night I used my phone to not only talk with him, but also to see his handsome face...

I especially appreciated this blessing last summer when Jeff was in China, as well as when Caleb traveled to Costa Rica.  Not only was I able to talk with my two favorite guys, but I could see them even though they were halfway around the world.

While phone technology can have its drawbacks, and we have to be careful that we don't allow it to control us, it is also a blessing.  So today, as I focus this month on blessings I often take for granted, I am thankful for iPhones and FaceTime that help me stay more connected to the people I love.