The last person in the world without a mobile phone
by Simon Collinson

 

 

I’m nearing the end of my life. I’ve lived it my way. I chose all my roads and followed them. One choice in particular, has attracted attention.

Which was my decision to forgo the delights of owning a mobile phone.

 

People all around me showed their displeasure at my choice.

I got it from all angles.

They told me things like, you need one for work, it's a necessity in today’s world, what about emergencies, what if I want to get in touch with you? It's an essential part of society you'll be out of touch, you won’t be able to manage, look how simple it is, even toddlers operate them now.

 

And if that didn’t sway me, they’d add, with obvious relish, that people will think you're odd, weird or maybe even mad.

 

They say that more and more about me around here. You should see the strange looks I get when it becomes known that I don't own a mobile phone and worse follows when I don't express a desire to have one.

It's as if I told them I enjoy eating liver and onions. At first it was tolerated, a mild eccentricity like Morris dancing. Now they find my mobile phoneless lifestyle a challenge, a threat, the Omega to their Alphas.

 

People started acting strangely. Treating me as a problem as if I had an addiction, or a disease. Maybe they were frightened that my lack of any desire to have a mobile phone was contagious. First there was concern, pity and advice, this soon turned into fear, hatred and loathing.

 

I got turned away from houses and social media, told to sling my hook, none of my family would have anything to do with me, my friends have blanked me out and left me off the invitation lists.

 

My wife was last to leave. The final straw was when they gave out mobile phones to all the tramps and the homeless. She said,“Look now everyone’s got one, but you, you're a stubborn dinosaur who won’t carry a mobile phone, you’ve got no identity. I'm sick of living with someone who's so stuck in the last century, it's like being married to Catweazel”.

 

 I said I’d give her a call on the landline but she just stuck two fingers up as she slammed the door. There was real hatred in her eyes. I wavered for a moment, but stuck to my guns.

 

I was determined to never own a mobile phone.

 

 

 

 

Well I've made it to my dying day and I'm glad to say I stuck by my choice to avoid using mobile phones. I even made them inscribe that on my gravestone.

 

“ Eli Rumble, the only person in the world not to have a mobile phone”

 

I was still chuckling as I made my way upwards to the bright lights of heaven.

There was quite the turn out. All the saints were sent marching out to meet me. My reputation as a person without a mobile phone had preceded me.

The saints parted to reveal a big man beaming with a big bushy beard.

 

The big man said, “We’ve been expecting you.”

 

I looked nonplussed.

And then saw all around me the holy ones get out their mobile phones taking selfies, swapping messages and memes. They were sending signals rapidly with a click click click. I noticed the big man had a massive shiny mobile phone.

 

The big man turned to me and said, “You can’t come in, you’ve not got a mobile phone, it's the other place for you. They’re like X, they’ll take anyone down there.”

 

I awoke to feel a searing pain in my buttucks as a grinning devil drove a red hot pitchfork repeatedly into my bottom, saying with each stab, “Who didn’t have a mobile phone, who didn’t have a mobile phone, who didn’t…

 

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