In Memoriam - The Phones of Melissa Ratliff

It takes a brave phone to serve as my phone. It's a dangerous, thankless job in which they will be dropped, drowned, lost, or stolen. Many have given their lives in order to serve my social needs and many have fallen. I just want to take a moment to pay homage to the phones that I have lost along the way.

*Cue The Lee Greenwood*

1. There was of course the Nokia 5110. My (and everyone else's) first phone.



We spent so much time together. Me losing you on high school field trips. Replacing you. The countless hours playing snake and the final ultimate death you came to when I dropped you down the stairs of my sorority house freshman year, shattering into multiple pieces of plastic. You were buried in the dumpster and my first taste of loss was tragic, but it would sadly not be the last.

2. The two silver Verizon phones, whose names I can't remember and will be henceforth referred to as the "Unknown Phones". I was excited for my shiny new phone when, not two weeks into having you, I left you in a classroom in the Fine Arts Building. I hunted and searched...but you were MIA. Verizon very nicely offered to replace you...and after I had, I found you again in the exact same classroom. So then I had two of you. I thought this was excellent...until I lost one in a rain puddle and the other met a similar fate in the toilet. Verizon was not so nice about the third replacement

3. Pink Motorola Rzr.

Remember when everyone wanted a Rzr? I do. And I had one. Oh how I cherished your girlyness. How I cried the first time I dropped you on the steps of my apartment. Oh the texts I sent. You lasted a long time, my friend. Through a trip to Europe, lots of travel, and lots of drops that I thought would be fatal. But somehow you survived....albeit it chipped and cracked. You were finally retired after your screen stopped working. You were the best of the best, and I salute you.


Gone but not forgotten.

4. Blackberries number 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 (No. I'm not kidding.)

Blackberries. You were weak. And yet there was something about you that kept me replacing you. Through loss of balls (That's not a euphemism), broken usb ports, and frozen screens you were the weakest of servicephones. Yet I kept giving you chance after chance. Once again you have failed me with the Blackberry Torch. I have learned my lesson...but I know being my phone isn't easy. So I forgive you....rest in pieces (Pun intended).

5. The iPhone

Given to me as a freebie, I couldn't complain about the iphone. It was a great phone, but it sucked my phone bill dry. And then out of the blue, The screen stopped working. Okay..so I was gesturing wildly with the phone in my hand, cracked it, and the screen went blank. I was sad, you didn't die a hero's death, but you served the greater good.

6. Other miscellaneous phones I have forgotten. I know there are many that have just stopped working or have disappeared. But I cannot remember you all.

We must not dwell on the past, we must look forward to the future. A future where my clumsiness will be no more and I can walk without dropping my mobile or without breaking the screen while using my hand in an animated fashion.


I am looking towards a bright new future. And I am looking for a few good phones.



Or just one, really...