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I'd like to tell you a story about Paul, a young lad raised in a small Pacific Northwest town.

     When he was quite young, his father had one of the first telephones in the neighbourhood.

     He marvelled at the well-polished old case fastened to the wall. The shiny receiver hung on the side of the box. He was too little to reach the telephone, but he used to listen with fascination when his mother used to talk to it.

     Then he discovered that somewhere inside the wonderful device lived an amazing person -- her name was Information Please and there was nothing she did not know. Information Please could supply anybody's number and even the correct time.

     His first personal experience with this genie-in-the-box came one day while his mother was visiting a neighbour. Amusing himself at the tool bench in the basement, he whacked his finger with a hammer. The pain was terrible, but there didn't seem to be any reason in crying because there was no one home to give him any sympathy.

     He walked around the house sucking his throbbing finger, finally arriving at the stairway and the telephone!

     Quickly he ran for the footstool in the parlour and dragged it to the landing.

     Climbing up he unhooked the receiver and held it to his ear. Information Please he said into the mouthpiece just above his head.

     A click or two and a small clear voice spoke into his ear, "Information."

     "I hurt my finger. . ." he wailed into the phone. The tears came readily enough now that he had an audience.

     "Isn't your mother home?" came the question.

     "Nobody's home but me," he blubbered.

     "Are you bleeding?"

     "No," he replied. "I hit my finger with the hammer and it hurts."

     "Can you open your icebox?"

     He said he could.

     "Then chip off a little piece of ice and hold it to your finger."

     After that he called Information Please for everything.

     He asked her for help with his geography and she told him where Washington was. She helped him with his math. And she told him his pet chipmunk, which he had caught in the park just the day before, would eat fruits and nuts.

     And there was the time that Petey, his pet canary died.

     He called Information Please and told her the sad story. She listened, then said the usual things grown-ups say to soothe a child. But he was unconsoled. Why is it that birds should sing so beautifully and bring joy to all families, only to end up as a heap of feathers, feet up on the bottom of a cage?

     She must have sensed Paul's deep concern, for she said quietly, "Always remember that there are other worlds to sing in."

     Somehow that made him feel better.

     Another day he was on the telephone. "Information Please."

     "Information," said the now familiar voice.

     "How do you spell fix?" 

     As I said, all this took place in a small town in the Pacific Northwest. Then the family moved across the country to Boston. The young lad missed his friend. Information Please belonged in that old wooden box back home and somehow he never thought of trying the tall, shiny new phone that sat on the hall table.

     Yet as he grew into his teens, the memories of those childhood conversations never really left him; often in moments of doubt and perplexity he would recall the serene sense of security he had then. He appreciated how patient, understanding, and kind she was to have spent her time on a little boy.

     A few years later, on his way west to college, he landed at Seattle. He had about half an hour between planes and spent 15 minutes or so on the phone with his sister, who lived in the city. Then without thinking what he was doing, he dialled his hometown operator and said, "Information Please.”

     Miraculously, he heard again the small, clear voice he knew so well, "Information."

     He hadn't planned this but heard himself saying, "Could you tell me please how to spell fix?'

     There was a long pause. Then came the soft spoken answer, "I guess your finger must have healed by now."

     He laughed, "So it's really still you. I wonder if you have any idea how much you meant to me during that time."

     "I wonder," she replied, "if you know how much your calls meant to me. I never had any children, and I used to look forward to your calls."

     He told her how often he had thought of her over the years and asked if he could call her again when he came back to visit his sister.

     "Please do, just ask for Sally."