Requiem for the Pay Phone: As Cell Phone Use Increases, an Icon Gradually Dies

“At one time, voices glanced against its metal walls. Dates were made here, secrets exchanged. Once people lined up, shifting from foot to impatient foot, pointedly lifting their watches, Hey, lady, how long you gonna talk?

“But today, the pay phone by the Rodman’s grocery store at Randolph and Selfridge roads in Wheaton stands empty, a smelly, rusting piece of metal and plastic. As if to highlight its obsolescence, Andres Castro stands right next to it and dials the office from his Nextel cell phone.

“He has come to demolish it.”

—Requiem for the Pay Phone: As Cell Phone Use Increases, an Icon Gradually DiesWashPost)

I cannot resist this opportunity to suggest an inexplicably popular work of interactive fiction, “Pick up the Phone Booth and Die.”