Just because we have the technology doesn’t mean we have to use it. 

I received three telephone “calls” from “Hillary Clinton” yesterday, as well as one from “Jack Nicholson,” also asking me to vote for Hillary Clinton.  But just in case you were wondering, it was not really Ms. Clinton calling me. It was (you guessed it!) a “robo call.”  A word that has entered our vocabulary  along with “carbon footprint.”  My mother would not know from either.  Nor would have I just ten years ago.

But I volunteered on a political campaign recently and called people from my neighborhood on behalf of Deval Patrick. (He won)  When I called, some people were shocked; when they found out I was not a robo call, but actually their neighbor.  “Hi, this is Michael Brown. I am your neighbor. I live down the hill from you, near the skating rink,” I would often say.

When they got over the shock that  I was a real person, more than one person said, “Well, I am going to vote for your guy, just because you called me.”  I thanked them and told them they would likely see me (“ a bald middle aged guy standing with a blue jacket at the polling place on election at 7 am”) when they came to vote.

I am not now and have never been a robo call.