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“Operator”
I heard a great song in my car yesterday – “Operator,” a 1972 folk/love song by Jim Croce. It’s a simple, beautiful song about a man’s effort to recover from a breakup with his girlfriend. What makes it so wonderful is that everyone can identify with the message. Everyone. Right? But then I started to wonder what someone would think of that song if they were under, say, 40 years old.
First of all, they would wonder, what the heck is a pay phone? Why would you need a dime to make a phone call? What is an operator? And why would you need the assistance of that person (or anyone else) to make a phone call? Ever heard of speed dial? Heck, just tell your phone to make the call and it does it on its own, right? And then, he can’t read the number on the matchbook because it’s old and faded. OK, so what is a matchbook, why would you be carrying one around, and why would you use that as a filing system for contacts? Many young people have forgotten the time when basically everybody smoked. Restaurants had complimentary matchbooks and ashtrays at the tables. And before cell phones, a matchbook might be the most convenient way to jot down a quick note, like a phone number. Lots of important information was written in matchbooks in those days. But there is something else in that song that I think many young people today would have difficulty identifying with:
The sense of longing. The pain of separation. Today, the guy in the song would be on his ex-girlfriend’s Snapchat and Instagram and he would rarely go more than a few hours without a running commentary of her current activities, in real time, complete with photographs. They would be texting, and maybe even FaceTiming and so on. It’s hard to miss someone when they don’t really leave.
I have three teenage daughters. They get nervous if their boyfriend doesn’t return a text within a certain amount of time. I’ll say, “Relax – he’s probably busy.” She’ll respond, “He posted on his Instagram 18 minutes ago. He’s on his phone, but he’s not responding to me. Something’s wrong.”
I can’t imagine dating in this environment. If one of us was busy, I would go days or weeks without seeing my girlfriend. And that was probably good. It gave us both a break. And a chance to think about things. No male can think with a pretty girl nearby.
Now, the availability and expectations of perpetual contact have had a profound impact on courting. I think it adds a lot of pressure, especially for the boyfriends. Lord help them.
Missing out on that sense of longing, to me, is really too bad. I think that how you handle being apart is a good indicator of how you’re likely to do together. But I sometimes think that it’s more than the sense of longing that today’s youth don’t fully understand.
I’m not convinced that they really understand love. Actual, true love. I suspect that some young people now would hear “Operator” and think to themselves, “What the heck? Has that dude never heard of Tinder?”
As the left has spent the last several decades successfully attacking traditional family structure and the role of men and women in that structure, they have also been promoting free love. Once the pill came out, and we dispensed with most of the restrictive religious and ethical limitations on sex, then relationships became more about sex than they are about the search for a lifetime soulmate.
In my view, the women’s liberation movement was really the men’s liberation movement. No more rules. If it feels good at the time, do it. Why not? If a woman won’t have sex with you, she’s not being sensible or selective, she’s just being a prude. Go find someone who will make you feel good. Because that’s what it’s all about. So girls start competing with one another not with beauty or personality, but simply with willingness to perform sexual favors for nearly anyone. This race to the bottom diminishes everyone involved.
Our obsession with sexual pleasure has led to neglect of other, more important things. Like love. Devotion. Longing. Sacrifice. All the things that make life truly beautiful.
All the things that make life truly beautiful.
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that when you watch movies, love stories rarely involve pornography, and pornography rarely involves love. We can see that in the dating scene now. Love can be difficult and painful, so it’s better to just stick with casual sex. That, at least, is fun. Less potential for emotional complications. And if it doesn’t work out, you haven’t really lost anything.
Of course, that also means that you really didn’t have anything to begin with. But, whatever.
So how does this end? We don’t know. It may be generations before we see the end result of our loss of interest in love. But I find it terrifying. One reason that human societies tend to be so violent is that, in my view, hate is a stronger emotion than love. This is especially true if we diminish the role of love in our lives. One might expect such a society to become more hateful, bitterly divided, and violent. So our disinterest in love is scary.
And sad. I miss beauty. The beauty of real, true love. Love – real, true love – is beautiful. It’s meaningful and real.
I only wish my words could just convince myself that it just wasn’t real.
But that’s not the way it feels.
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Croce’s got a cure for sad songs too…I can’t hear Bad, Bad Leroy Brown without singing along on the chorus. That song can loop in your head for hours if you don’t chase it out with another.
I agree with you and it is very saddening.
But do your daughters know they are “courting”?
And sacrifice is a forgotten part of love; no one seems to care about that part of it.
I’ve always said, even as a young man, that you never know what it’s like to be with a woman – a mate – at thirty years if you never get past seven – and now I’d say, two.
Divorce has perhaps been worse than the pill. Does anyone mean – does anyone know – the marriage vows any longer? For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, for better or worse, til death do us part?
I know I’m not addressing the main theme of the post but your matchbook comments were a hook. Couple of months ago I was with my wife as she was purchasing a pair of shoes. The cashier told her to insert her card into one of the ubiquitous card readers, but it wasn’t reading. So the cashier handed her a business card and suggested she put that under the card to get it to read. It worked!
I mentioned that it was just like the old days when you had to stuff a matchbook in with the 8 track tape to get it to connect properly. The early 20 something cashier looked at me with a stare that said “What on earth are you talking about?” I realized then that she not only had no idea what an 8 track tape was, but a matchbook was an alien concept as well.
And yes, Operator has been on loop in my brain since yesterday. Thanx a lot.
I remember when we had a telephone in the house. And we had a second phone, an extension, in the basement. It was more expensive, but considered indispensable when spending the day doing the laundry. So one line was pretty much all you had for the family.
And if you were out of the house, you were incommunicado. If you couldn’t answer the phone, you said, “They’ll call back if it’s important.”
And people seemed to take greater appreciation of using the phone because it was expensive, and there was no call waiting, no caller ID to screen calls, and no texting, tweeting, or e-mailing to provide any other same-day contact. It was telephone or a letter.
Are we missing something for not writing letters any longer?
Many days after school (in the 70s) I’d get home and the phone would ring. Usually my mother – she’d always say “Hi, are you home?” I always laughed inwardly with the thought of “Yes Mom. I’m home. You called me here. How else would I answer the phone?”
I’ve tried to explain this anecdote to my kids. They don’t understand why her question would be funny.
My mother lived thousands of miles from her brothers and sisters. When she passed I found many many letters and a treasure trove of pictures that were sent to her over the years.
That said, I love that my brothers and sisters and I can all be on a continuous text thread.
That said again, young women don’t understand men. When JY went too long between phone calls, when he would finally call, the call lasted about five minutes. Things to do, people to see.
And I never, ever called him. My mother made a point of throwing away the phone numbers of boys that called my sisters and me. When she dug his # out of the trash and told me to call him back I knew she agreed with me; he was the one.
30 years later it irritated me no end – I’d pick up my son and his friends from football practice and their phones would be ringing within minutes.
In my view, the women’s liberation movement was really the men’s liberation movement. No more rules. If it feels good at the time, do it. Why not? If a woman won’t have sex with you, she’s not being sensible or selective, she’s just being a prude. Go find someone who will make you feel good. Because that’s what it’s all about. So girls start competing with one another not with beauty or personality, but simply with willingness to perform sexual favors for nearly anyone. This race to the bottom diminishes everyone involved.
Correct. Oh, and your brilliant 16-year-old daughter has some growing up to do.
Thanks pal. I can’t hear that song or “Longer than” by Dan Vogelberg without crying. So now I’m crying. Come to think of it, I can’t hear the opening notes of “In Memory of Elizabeth Reed” or the fifth verse of “Jesus ist kommen, Grund ewiger Freude” without crying. Or read “The Wanderer” without crying. I cry a lot.
Well, the Backstreet Boys brought the telephone song genre into the era of cell phones, low batteries, and dropped calls:
Although their version is about cheating on a girlfriend rather than longing for her company…
You don’t mess around with Jim, either.
Heck. Leader of the Band.
After that song, I’ve always kinda wanted an Eldorado too.
Same Auld Lang Syne. It isn’t Christmas until I’ve heard it.
And those horns. I hate horns (generally). But they give me goose flesh they’re so, so … beautiful, a joyous lament.
Southside! Haven’t thought about that guy for a long time. But loved loved this song.
( a cursory search didn’t find Southside singing my favorite song EVER (once upon a time) but I swear I have it on cassette somewhere. Bruce was the best I could do. And the SOB is butchering it – thank God for Clarence. Southside was better.
Um, because then it’s no longer a sad song?
My own contribution: (I guess I’m younger than most of you…)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uWhkbDMISl8
Whippersnapper!
Speaking, sort of, of Auld Lang Syne:
I wouldn’t do that now. Deet deedee dedee deet.
She’s 16. of course she’s smarter than you. We were all smarter than our parents at 16.
A couple of random thoughts that came up while reading the column.
I really miss matches, even though I never smoked. I especially miss strike anywhere matches, which apparently are now illegal, because you can’t buy them. I did buy about 100 books of matches on Amazon about a year ago, so I don’t have to use a lighter to burn my trash (Yeah, that is something else most young people never experience, but I still do it).
Time apart does increase love. When my wife and I were dating, I had moved away to start a new job. A few months later, I flew home. She met me at the gate (another thing you can’t do today). That was almost 36 years ago, but that moment when I saw her, and then hugged her is still one of the most memorable, pleasureful, and exciting moments of my life. BTW, at the point in time when I stepped off the plane, we had never discussed marriage, by the end of the week she was my wife.
During the above mentioned time apart, we wrote letters to each other. My wife still has them. Do you think anyone will still have text messages that they write today in 40 years. I doubt it, if for no other reason than no one puts the thought and effort into a text that we did when we wrote letters.
That is exactly the beauty that I’m trying to describe. You are so fortunate to have experienced it. So blessed.
Here ya go…I might have been at this one! (ETA: tag @annefy; note that used to be Southside’s final encore in concert.)
Well, Blondie takes me back too. Could not go out on a Saturday night without watching Top of the Pops and seeing Blondie perform “Heart of Glass” for the 100th time. Would often see her (Debbie Harry) around the west end as well.
Great article uses a great vehicle to bring up much worth thinking about, especially for those of us who have been around through all of it.
My favorite operator song was Pink Floyd’s Young Lust: Pink Floyd is making a collect overseas call to his wife and a man answers. And then hangs up. And the operator calls back.
While there is no telephone involved (and it would necessarily have been an AT&T operator), I don’t think Sylvia is all that different from Warren Zevon’s Tenderness on the Block.
Get yer strike anywhere right here.
The rush of technology is indeed a pain for songwriters. I wrote a song about a beachbum with the lines, “You say my pager’s shaking / I don’t hear a thing.” A decade or so later, I sometimes wonder how many people don’t know what a pager is, or if it belongs in a beach song.
The next verse ends: “I hear the phone ringing / I would never make it back in time / But, please, don’t call back again.” That could be why I’m still single.
Love, love Sylvia’s Mother.
Here’s a country entry Garth Brooks’ Callin’ Baton Rouge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQK8uj01JhI
I spent last night in the arms of a girl in Louisiana
And though I’m out on the highway, my thoughts are still with her
Such a strange combination of a woman and a child
Such a strange situation stoppin’ every hundred miles
Callin’ Baton RougeA replay of last night’s events roll through my mind
Except a scene or two erased by sweet red wine
And I see a truck stop sign ahead, so I change lanes
I need a cup of coffee and a couple dollars change
Callin’ Baton RougeOperator, won’t you put me on through
I gotta send my love down to Baton Rouge
Hurry up, won’t you put her on the line
I gotta talk to the girl just one more timeHello, Samantha dear, I hope you’re feelin’ fine
And it won’t be long until I’m with you all the time
But until then, I’ll spend my money up right down to my last dime
Callin’ Baton RougeOperator, won’t you put me on through
I gotta send my love down to Baton Rouge
Hurry up, won’t you put her on the line
I gotta talk to the girl just one more time
Callin’ Baton RougeSweet Baton Rouge