For me, cell phones are a smash hit

But as often has I've indicated -- whined -- about keeping up with the Joneses of cell phones, I have to admit -- fancy phones were not made for me.

First of all, my mind works like a baby boomer's when it comes to technology, and I'm just proud of myself for learning how to text message a couple years ago. All in all, I'm pretty old fashioned and prefer using a phone for what it was invented -- to call people!

But not getting an iPhone goes beyond the fact I probably would not know how to utilize its many functions.

Why?

Because I am the cell phone destroyer.

I probably purchased my first cell phone in the late 1990s, while I was still in college. I'm not sure how I ditched or destroyed that one, but I'm glad I did, because it was one of those early cell phones that looked like a cordless home phone.

I believe I went without a phone after that for a short period of time. When I moved to Tennessee, in 2002, I'm certain I had no cell phone. I remember my mom, who had helped me move here, leaving me. I was scared, and I felt so lonely.

It would take a couple of weeks for BellSouth to hook up my landline phone and I remember spending the entire Easter Sunday homesick and on the pay phone in the old Bi-Lo parking lot. I'd been here for just three days.

I purchased a cell phone shortly after that depressing holiday, and that phone lasted a few months. One day, I was in the shower when my cell phone began ringing. I jumped out of the shower to answer it, but upon putting the phone up to my ear it slipped through my hand. Yes, you guessed it -- the phone landed in the toilet.

A while after I met my husband, Jack, we bought new, matching cell phones together one day, and signed up for the family plan. We thought our phones were so cool, but today, you'd laugh at their simplicity. Fancy phones with cameras and other technologies came in style, and my friends laughed at me when I couldn't open pictures they'd send me, but Jack and I held onto our little silver Samsungs.

That basic phone stayed with me for years and as much as I longed for a more advanced phone, I couldn't seem to ditch this one ... until I went to New York one weekend two years ago.

I was staying at my father's house, in his furnished basement, and as I tried to tippy-toe downstairs one night in the dark, trying not to wake my father, I stumbled into something and my cell phone paid the price. It bounced down the entire flight of stairs and broke into a million little pieces.

A friend loaned me a phone (ironically, it was the same model as the one I had just broken) until I could get a new one.

My red Razor phone was the next purchase, and what a step up it was for me! It was in style at the time, could take pictures, and, best of all, it was pretty!

The red phone lasted for an eternity (about a year and a half), considering what it went through. That tough little thing was dropped, stepped on and left behind more times than I care to admit, but its life eventually came to an end, just like all the others.

I was having a grand time with friends and co-workers at the Bedford County Fair last July and worked up my nerve to ride the Zipper. The dizzying ride was so much fun -- and jolting -- that my cell phone jumped right out of my pocket and fell about 100 feet to the ground. Another one bites the dust, I sadly thought.

T-G co-worker John Carney sold me a spare phone he happened to have on hand, and that lasted a few months until it died of natural causes.

A few months ago, I purchased a Go Phone, another boring, inexpensive, basic and again, archaic phone (it happened to be the Samsung model from two years ago).

It was another phone that didn't even have a camera, but hey, it worked ... until one night last week.

As I sat down, after a really long day at the office, to enjoy some hot, fresh pizza with a tall glass of Coke, my phone slid out of my hands -- and this time it didn't end up in the toilet. My aim is so good when it comes to cell phones that this one managed to end up right inside my glass of Coke!

Now here I am with another GoPhone -- not exactly the iPhone I'd like to have.

-- Sadie Fowler is lifestyles editor at the Times-Gazette. Her column, Sadie Says, runs every Sunday. She may be reached at sfowler@t-g.com or 684-1200 ext. 214.