Is it just us?  Zack and I each spent an inordinate amount of time this morning on the telephone making and receiving several different “business calls” on a variety of subjects. Sometimes it seems everything just falls on your head at once. Modern life has become so depersonalized with the automated voice prompts, the difficulty reaching a real person with whom to speak, the globalization of business (where the person who controls some area of life in one’s own little realm is no longer local but will try to help from another state or country —sometimes, it seems, another planet. Then there’s often the seemingly impossible challenge of finding intelligent life out there when a live person is actually reached. It makes me nervous for the future of the human race as a whole.Is it just us?  Zack and I each spent an inordinate amount of time this morning on the telephone making and receiving several different “business calls” on a variety of subjects. Sometimes it seems everything just falls on your head at once. Modern life has become so depersonalized with the automated voice prompts, the difficulty reaching a real person with whom to speak, the globalization of business (where the person who controls some area of life in one’s own little realm is no longer local but will try to help from another state or country —sometimes, it seems, another planet. Then there’s often the seemingly impossible challenge of finding intelligent life out there when a live person is actually reached. It makes me nervous for the future of the human race as a whole.

There are too many layers. It’s not like when I call the local feed store and tell them I think I paid my bill twice and they say, “No problem. Do you want a check or to apply it to next month’s bill?” So easy and stress free. Sensible, cordial response. Problem solved. (Actually, I think THEY caught it first and called ME. I just love small towns!)  

I won’t go into too many details, because, let’s face it, you all have your own difficulties like this, and you don’t need to be frustrated with ours. There’s already enough stress in your life. Believe me, we’re frustrated enough. (If I drank, I’d go throw back a double). One situation involved a problem with a utility company meter reader failing to relock a gate he had unlocked on our property (twice). The first person took the report but wasn’t able or willing to give the name of a local supervisor and also unable or unwilling to give even the location and contact information of the corporate offices of the company.  If no one in customer service has a clue as to who supervises our meter reader, how can someone eventually find the supervisor so he can remind the reader to secure a customer’s property? It took several phone calls and an email to receive a response from someone locally. That phone number is no longer listed in our phone book. The only way to reach our local folks is to dial the toll free number, speak to someone in another state, and hope for the best. (Take a valium first).  Because of deregulation, there are so many layers now that one hand has trouble knowing what the other is doing. And the rates have gone up, not down. Believe me, it frustrates the employees as much as the clients.

One of our calls involved the disappearance of funds from an investment account. You know how it’s possible to check your own accounts now online? Well, suddenly, a lot of money that used to be there yesterday just wasn’t any longer. Gone. Vamoose. Disappeared. How about that for a surprise?  Our various problems with this major national company have been ongoing for well over a month. Every time we call, we speak to a different person (often in a different office in a different part of the country). There is little continuity. Incorrect papers are sent to be filled out. Time is wasted. No one there seems to know what they’re doing. Corporate America. It really makes you wonder.

Another call was to Social Security. Three times, on three different occasions a specific question has been asked of three different people. A different answer had been received each time. Ah, government.

Everyone knows that when one asks for technical assistance these days, it’s probable one will be connected to someone in another country who has little command of the English language. So I’m guessing I don’t even need to go any further in this explanation.

One call required us to listen to three rounds of automated prompts before “0” could be pressed in desperation —because we knew from the get-go it would be necessary to speak to a real live person.

I think I can stop now, although there was more. You get the idea. Now that I’ve whined and complained sufficiently, I must add one very important thing. Bet you thought I was going to say that this is just part of modern life. It shouldn’t be, but it is. And we all have to deal with it. Well, no, I’m going to say something else.

As we have found through misfortunes of our own and those of our friends —whose deathly serious problems, losses, and sadness lately seem to have trumped ours geometrically (is it the configuration of the stars, or what?)—EVEN THE BAD DAYS ARE GOOD DAYS. I know people lying in hospitals right now teetering painfully on the brink between here and the other side who would give anything they had for the frustrating morning Zack and I just spent. And I wish to heaven I could give them that gift. We all should take deep breaths and count our blessings each and every day.

Gene Ellis, Ed.D is a Bosque County resident who returned to the family farm after years of living in New Orleans, New York, and Florida. She’s an artist who holds a doctoral degree from New York University and is writing a book about the minor catastrophes of life. Check out Genie’s blog at  http://rusticramblings.wordpress.com/