So, there I was, sitting at the kitchen table, eating a positively heavenly lunch. Sushi, frozen peach slices, nutella on pretzels, and a glass of milk. Heavenly. I was reading a book.
When the wall rang.
Like the sentence, “The phone rang.” Only it was a wall.
Just one crystal-clear, old-fashion r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-i-n-g. Then silence.
We have a pretty average kitchen wall. Not too exotic, not too dull. There’s an open cupboard full of flower vases and jars of rice, nuts, and things like that right next to the table. I looked this over very carefully to make sure nothing had a phone hiding under it. I peeked inside some of the vases (with the alarming suspicion I might see a spider with a cell phone up to his ear). I scoured underneath the newspapers and magazines on the table. I ducked under the table to check the floor.
No phone.
Like I said: “the wall rang.”
The first time it happened, I automatically said in my best phone recording voice, “I’m sorry. No one is available to take your call. Please leave a message after the tone.”
The second time it happened, I started thinking about all those young adult fantasy books I’ve been reading lately and thought perhaps I ought to delve into something a little less otherworldly in the near future.
The third time it happened, I began to wonder if God doesn’t sometimes call people when He wants to talk. Literally. Call them. Then I thought, well, but He really ought to point out the means of communication if He’s going to go that route.
I am now recording this sequence of events in the rather hopeless hope that someone somewhere in this vaguely unsettling world has had a wall ring on them in the past and can therefore explain the inexplicable? Why the wall mice have taken a sudden interest in stealing our technology. How the vases learned to talk. What “r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-r-i-n-g” means translated into English. Why the wall is calling me.
