Please, Don’t Leave That on My Door Mat

In the bitter cold and half-light of a winter morning, I watched a large white van crunch across the ice in my cul-de-sac.

Two hooded men trailed the back of the van, periodically reaching into the open back doors. One man went right, the other went left, as they visited the front doors of each of my neighbors.

Up the walkway, turn around, cut across the yard to the next house. Repeat.

Oh, no.

Phone books.

I saw one of the men approach my house.

Thud.

It would have saved time if they had just put the relic in my garbage can and saved me the trouble.

Phone books have long outlived their usefulness. They probably reached their height of usefulness in the early 1990s. It’s been rapid obsolescence ever since.

Want to find an old friend? Facebook beats the phone book any day.

Want to find a business? It’s called Google Local search.

Phone books are dead.

Unfortunately, this won’t stop a host of proprietors from paying thousands of dollars a month for ad space and pinning their hopes on a hunk of paper that almost nobody uses anymore.

-Ryan M. Healy