Monday, August 24, 2009

The game of telephone

Yesterday's account of going to the garage sale and buying that phone from the woman who did not want to talk about Leonard Pennario has elicited all kinds of interesting breakthroughs.

One of the best messages I got was from my Facebook friend Ryan Lysarz. I do not know Ryan Lysarz. I do remember "friend"-ing him on Facebook but I saw that he was about 20 years old and atheist and I did not know that he and I would have this big overriding thing in common: a love for vintage phones.

My new friend Ryan writes:

Congratulations on your purchase of a rotary phone. Just be careful, because they can be addictive. The first step is always the beige model 500 desk phone. Then you realize you also need a rotary wall phone for the kitchen. A princess phone for the bedroom. One of those rotary trimline phones for the living room. Don't even get me started on all of the available colors. Soon, like me, you'll have an entire collection. Or perhaps not.

I wrote back to him something like "Ryan, you sound like someone out of the movies." Which is a big compliment coming from me! When I met Leonard Pennario I thought he was like something out of the movies. He was!

Ryan wrote back modestly:

It's not a huge collection, only about 10 or so. When I see an interesting phone that's inexpensive, I buy it. That doesn't happen often, because 90% of the rotary phones at yard sales and thrift stores are the same model and color that you bought. Oh, and I hope I don't sound like I'm out of a movie about a crazy person.!

Howard and I were laughing about what it is in human nature that makes us collect stuff. Well, it is in the nature of animals too. Dogs squirrel away bones. Squirrels squirrel away acorns. It is funny how the word "squirrel" has become a verb, meaning to hoard.

Remember the doctor who squirreled away performances of that Liszt piano sonata and had something like 350 of them and needed Pennario's first recording? I was glad to have contributed to what I can see is one of the world's great collections.

Now I am inspired by Ryan to new heights.

I must get a princess phone!


Ryan said...

I can't believe I'm the subject of a web log post! I feel so honored!

For the record, your new Facebook Friend Ryan is the same mysterious Ryan who occasionally comments here. I visited your Facebook page and noticed that most of the commenting on your web log posts actually takes place over there. So I decided I'd friend you.

By the way, I'm not 20 years old, I'm 26 years old.

Larry said...

Well, you fooled me today. When the page opened, I just knew that I was going to read, "...and that picture above is me eating a Hazel nut'. :)

BTW, the good doctor needed the 1959 version, not the 1952. The '52 is much more common. I sent you a link to the '59, just in case another 'collector' comes along.

Cool, Ryan!

Mary Kunz Goldman said...

RYAN!!!! son of a hash-slinging sea cook, you could have knocked me over with a feather!!! I had no idea that Facebook Friend Ryan was you!!! Or that you were Facebook Friend Ryan.

You are the reason we say Web log and not blog, isn't that right? Now I will have to go back and re-read your comments.

The mysteries of the Internet!

Mary Kunz Goldman said...

And Larry, how could I forget it was the '59 Pennario Liszt and not the '52 that the good doctor wanted. That drama went on for weeks!