(July 31st article on Ricochet)

Back in March of this year, my phone service with Sprint was due to expire. The contract had been a nightmare; I had tried to get out of it twice to lower the $200 a month plan my wife and I somehow managed to get ourselves into, but it was no dice. I am not criticizing their service, rather, I am poking at myself. I should have read the fine print, and I didn’t. My fault.

In February, while the snow fell, my wife and I went to the North Shore to Best Buy for a set of headphones. My cat mangled my old ones, and I was fairly certain this pair wouldn’t make it through the weekend.

“I can’t wait for my contract to expire with Sprint.”

“Why? I haven’t had any problems with the service.”

“It’s just too expensive. The service is good, we just can’t afford to be spending two thousand, four hundred dollars a year on cell phones.”

My phone was sitting in the cup holder, while Bethany’s was in her purse. Her purse was open. Since we were talking about phones, she took hers out and began pinning on Pinterest.

The following day I arrived home from teaching my class to find a FedEx package on the table.

“Did you order something from Amazon?” my wife asked.

“Not that I’m aware of,” I replied. It wasn’t the response my wife was looking for. She knows I buy books frequently. Instead of spending the next ten minutes wondering what was in it, I tore it open.

It was a letter. From Sprint.

In much more elaborate terms than I mention here, the letter said that they didn’t want to see me leave, and that they were willing to give me a free upgrade to an iPhone 6 if I stayed.

“That’s a coincidence,” I explained to my wife. Then I looked at the FedEx package. It was overnight delivery.

“You think they were listening in the car yesterday?”

It was certainly possible. While I am not one of those people who thinks the government is always listening to my phone conversations, it is a possibility.

“For years, my Aunt used to say that this was happening,” my wife told me. “I used to think she was crazy. Now I’m not so sure.”

Neither am I.