Trena Eiden

John Knox once wrote, “You cannot antagonize and influence at the same time.”  

My client has a landline for all her calling needs. It’s the same number she’s had since Alexander Graham Bell started the whole shebang. Unfortunately, she gets hackers and scammers multiple times each day. I’ve never seen anything like it. Starting at 7 a.m., she has Medicare shams, weirdo car insurance salesman, phony warranty deed guys, quack credit card companies, banking fakes, software creeps, home siding frauds and probably half a dozen more. The worst part for her is that she answers every call because she can’t tell if it’s one of her sisters or a friend wanting to chat. We’ve told her to hang up immediately, but she doesn’t. Instead, she debates them over their facts. No matter how long she keeps them on the phone, it's no deterrent. They incessantly call back.  

Last week, she was in the bathroom when the phone rang. I answered and it was a woman hacker calling to announce she had information about my client’s car being in an accident and she had an extended warranty just for her. She’s never been in an accident so just to be meanspirited I began speaking gibberish. After 30 seconds of listening to me spew nonsense, the woman, who barely spoke English herself, asked, “Can you speak English?” I gave her a few more babba mabba fibuji goanno mudafulo wawo, then said, “No. I can’t.”  

Later, my client was undergoing physical therapy when the phone rang. I again answered, and a strong accented foreign voice asked if my client might be there? Unsure of what he wanted, I skeptically asked, “Are you a hacker?” He was taken aback and chirped, “Uh, what, no, no, I’m an old friend.” I asked his name and told him to call back in half an hour. When I mentioned what happened, my client got a bang out of it and laughed, “Ya, I haven’t seen him in 20 years, but he’s real.” I felt I should call him back to apologize, but maybe he gets the ridiculous calls too and understood. If not, John Knox is right. I couldn’t antagonize and influence at the same time, but let’s not start a rumor. Influencing isn’t my greatest strength. It’s antagonizing where I really shine, almost like God lets me roam the earth to acquaint people with the realization that he made a few oddities.  

Scientists just uncovered something extraordinary. The human voice is not just breath and sound vibrating off our vocal cords. Our voices are an orchestra of precision that coordinates dozens of systems to work simultaneously. Muscles tighten and release in millisecond accuracy. Airflow is regulated by the diaphragm, the larynx shifts shape like a living instrument and the brain computes language, tone and meaning faster than a supercomputer. It’s a level of communication so grand that nothing remotely close has that level of sophistication. Evolutionists are baffled. I am not, it’s God’s work. 

Since our brain can compute language, tone and meaning, why are teenagers clueless when asked to clean their room, then comply when the octaves go up? They understand the assignment, just not how it applies to them. Scammers are similar. They hear a voice screeching, “Stop calling!” Yet, every day they’re on the job.  

A cellphone doesn’t always tell you who the caller is either so when I answer a fraud call, I’ve been known to exclaim, “Frank! You said you’d be here to mow today! Last week you never trimmed the hedges or dug up the flower beds. I’m firing you.” Once, a guy said, “My name’s not Frank, it’s Robert.” Another time, the scammer had the audacity to chuckle, “You’re very good at this, you’re full of it” (He has no idea).  

The best might have been the day I got a junk call and I’d had a bad day (which is any day I actually have to put forth effort). I was working outside and had to run for the phone. When I answered and realized it was garbage, I yelled, “Leonard! You left me at the altar! I was so embarrassed and now I can’t face anyone again! If you didn’t want to marry me, you should have just told me!” The guy on the line spoke softly, “Miss, I’m so sorry. I feel badly that happened to you. I will hang up now. Sorry. Sorry.”  

If I was a good person, I’d have felt bad. I didn’t and that’s all you need to know about me.