RIVER CITY JOURNAL: IF YOU NEED IMMEDIATE ASSISTANCE, GET OFF THE PHONE

Surely this has happened to you too. You call someone to get some information. Instead you get a recording which usually ends with a beep. Then you are supposed to talk to a machine.

You know what happens next: The person you called returns your call, but by now you have gone to the break room to get another cup of coffee. So the person you called winds up talking to your machine.

Pretty soon, there is a conversation of recorded calls back and forth. In some rare cases, you actually wind up talking to a human being. Too bad it isn't the person you called.

This is real life in the modern world of instant communication. It is instant only if you count machines among your Top 10 acquaintances.

You know how some folks think there are parallel worlds in which another you has a life? And how sometimes these parallel worlds bump into each other and you run into yourself for a fleeting moment?

While trying to reach a human being the other day and waiting for that person's machine to talk to me, I wondered if modern technology has created another world linked by telephone lines, microwaves and cellular signals.

I call it the voice-mail dimension.

If you are like millions of human beings who contend with electronic communications each day, you agree with me: I love voice mail.

And I hate it.

But let's face it. In the voice-mail dimension, entire lives are being lived, tragedies are being played out, triumphs are occurring. We don't even know for sure what all is going on. But we can imagine it.

For example, it occurs to me that a good deal of voice-mail communication may not even involve a human being. One mechanical voice talks to another mechanical voice. Maybe one asks the other out to dinner. They start dating. Then one voice pops the question. Pretty soon they are dialing all their voice-mail friends inviting them to the nuptials.

Bah, you say. This couldn't happen. No? Then how do you explain that mysterious charge that shows up on your credit card? The one for the honeymoon suite in Maui? Try explaining that to your wife, who keeps saying it sure would be nice if we could go to Hawaii, and you keep saying we can't afford it. Oh, sure, you call the credit-card company and tell them there's been a mistake. But you and I know what really happened.

I suppose there are spats in the voice-mail dimension too, just like in real life. And child rearing, and job hunting, and grocery shopping, and picking videos to watch. (Denizens of the voice-mail dimension don't go to the movies. Instead, they network with cable systems and VCRs.)

Then comes the day when a mechanical voice that's been around for years and years finally goes to the big databank in the sky. Word goes out in a digital gush of electrically charged emotion. Friends show up for the wake and say things like:

"He always sounded so cute. Beep."

"Yeah, I thought he would be a lot taller. Beep."

"Remember when he used to imitate Jay Leno? Beep."

"Oh, sure. Then that power surge speeded up his recording so fast he sounded like Roseanne. Beep."

"Sure gonna miss him. Beep."

"So long, old buddy. Beep."

"When your message is over, please press the pound sign. Beep."

Really. It happens all the time. I'm just sure of it.

~R. Joe Sullivan is the editor of the Southeast Missourian.