What did we do before cell phones?

I enjoy these types of discussions and have them regularly with my daughters. I'm fascinated that people can't imagine "coping" without a cell phone :) Friends would spend time together at school or go to each other's homes after school. Plans were made in advance - no last minute, on the run, "yeah I'll be there in 5" phone calls unless it was from a phone booth. People made plans on their landline or met up in one place (in person!) and decided what to do from there. There was no hooking up or breaking up via text message. You either told the person face to face, wrote a note or used the "wildly successful" (please note the tongue in cheek here) method of asking a friend to speak to the guy or girl for you. After dinner, I used to get up and walk or ride my bike to a friend's house instead of walking to my room to IM someone that lived right next door. I have a cell phone and have for many years. I don't need it. I rarely use it. I have it for emergencies only. I like the security of always having a phone with me in the car and I like that each of my girls has one so they can reach me at any time. I'm not technologically backward. In fact, I believe I'm rather computer literate (working from home, I don't have a "tech department" to fix my problems so I've learned a lot). I've done a lot of work, professionally, with young people online and I'm very involved in what my own kids do with their computers. Technology makes life so much easier but I can absolutely envision living without quite a few aspects of it... and it wouldn't bother me in the least to be unreachable! Imagine the peace and quiet! LOL :)

My generation grew up with telephones, only they had wires attached to them. We even had cars too. We also had television, although it was black and white and only had two channels. I think there was more on television in those days, and there was plenty to do. You met your friends at school and met real people in real time. Some people actually wrote letters too. Like television, all the cell phone calls and text messaging does not mean quantity means quality. [i] "How r u" "ok" "i m bored" "life sucks" "see u latr"[/i] Yes, some days you did not talk to your friends 17 times a day but that might have been a good thing.