The following item was written by Sheila Lester, a member of my writers critique group, The Scribblers. I think many of us have experienced something similar…unless we’re under age 21.

When I die, my idea of Heaven will be a place that is NOT filled with any electronic, electrical, mechanical, technical, or any other kind of “ical” or “nic” items. I do not want to see, hear, touch, smell, or taste anything that has to do with The Web, The Net, The Wireless World––nothing, nada, zip, zero.

Please save me from an afterlife of beeps and buzzes, of tweets and texts, of ringing and routing. I do not want to Press One for English, Press Two for Spanish, Press Three to confirm that I am who I am, Press Four for Customer Service, Press Five to choose which Customer Service I need, Press Six for New Product, Press Seven for warranty information, Press Eight for an automatic call back because all lines are busy and there are no recordings to help you just now, Press Nine to repeat the menu, and Press Zero, which will automatically disconnect you after keeping you on hold for an excruciatingly long time.

I have wasted, yes WASTED, a good part of my life in the past week alone, all to deal with recalcitrant contraptions. I have pushed, pulled, tipped, twisted, and generally performed gyrations a woman of my age should not have to perform, only to try to read impossibly small, incredibly long and complex identifying marks some malevolent person––or more likely, a malicious machine––placed in the most unlikely spot that is absolutely necessary to identify the electronic thingamajig that has decided to stop performing its service at the most inopportune time.

After putting it off until nearly the last minute, I was under the gun to print copies of a writing I was planning to share the following day. A few days before that, my printer had refused to print until I unplugged and then plugged it in again. Apparently it was giving me fair warning. It decided this was the time to revolt. I unplugged and plugged in, I turned off and on. Repeat. Repeat. Then, becoming more desperate I even deleted and reinstalled the printer program. No response.

A couple of hours had transpired when I suddenly remembered something my son had said: “Someone will always give advice on the Internet. Look for a chatroom and read what they have to say.”

It didn’t take too long before I found a conversation, and only a few lines into the chats one of the people mentioned the same error message that was showing up on my printer. He said that he had contacted HP and had received a new printer! Although I had purchased this new machine about nine months ago, maybe this was a good solution for me.

I went to the HP website and finally found a Customer Service chat button, clicked on it, and was put in touch with ‘Sean’ Amok. The minute I typed in the error code, he asked for my address and told me he would be sending out a refurbished printer. And, for a few dollars more, I could purchase an extended warranty. Of course, he suggested three-year coverage, but the cost was nearly what I paid for the useless machine in the first place. I opted for one year, just in case.

Much to my surprise, the new/old machine arrived in only two days. Not too amazing when I noticed the return address was Calexico, CA. Although ‘Sean’ was located in some far-off land, HP had a ready supply of replacements right here in the good old USA.

Installing the new printer should have taken only a few minutes because it was wireless and all I had to do was plug the old electrical cord into the new machine. That sounded simple enough. However…there was a slight glitch. When I went to the HP site as directed, I was advised that the warranty on that particular machine had expired. Guess refurbishing was faster than the paperwork. So, with nothing else to do, I again went to the chat site and this time talked to ‘Howard’ who did some magic on his side and I was able to complete the set up. (Actually, ‘Howard’ did all the work.)

Yesterday, my computer browser told me I needed to sign on again because the password I was trying to use was incorrect. (NO, IT WASN’T!) Having had this happen before, I gave in quickly and did all of the things you have to do to reset your password. Done.

But wait, there’s more. From a past experience (another long, sad story), I realized I had to change the password on my iPhone, both for incoming and outgoing mail. Done. Then, my clever little phone told me that my wireless connection was no longer hooked up. Again, I tried to follow the very simple instructions on the phone, first by myself, and then back to the Internet for a how-to instruction video. After checking out three different suggestions, I decided my best bet was to go to my phone/wireless/internet provider because I was told they would give me the mystic password that I needed to hook up to them. The password I had known and loved for years was not working. What a surprise!

I went through the Press One, Press Two routine and eventually was told, by a recorded voice, that the password I needed would be texted to me in two separate texts, for security reasons, of course.

Lo and behold, it wasn’t more than a couple of minutes and there was the text with exactly what I needed––a password consisting of sixty-four letters and numbers. I heaved a sigh, copied those numbers from my phone to a piece of paper, and then went to the screen on my phone where I needed to enter the numbers.

Ever so carefully, I watched my fat little fingers as I entered the numbers. Oops! The button I needed to click to send those numbers disappeared when I entered the last number. I took a deep breath and entered the numbers and letters once more. And again, the little button disappeared as I entered the last number. I am lucky I’m so very smart––I finally realized the O’s were actually zeros. (I think it was about the fourth time before I had that epiphany.) The good news is, I am now hooked up to my wireless, and my phone can converse with the world.

Now you know why, in my Heaven, I want only paper, pencils, an eraser, and a fairly sharp knife to keep the pencils working properly. As for long distance communication, I will settle for two tin cans and a string.