Phoning Home: Reflections on Sunday Night Calls from College

When our boys are away at school we are practitioners of the Sunday night phone call ritual. In the age of cell phones, I’m not entirely sure how or why this age-old tradition has taken hold for us, but it has.

Most weeks John, our college senior, calls somewhere between 7 and 9 p.m. He updates us on the week that was. His mother passes along the news from extended family, fishes for random bits of information about his social life, and covers the transactional business (e.g. banking, online shopping, doctors’ appointments that need scheduling, etc.). I ask about the weekend, we talk sports (usually the Red Sox as well as some other seasonal happening – how his fantasy football team fared, March Madness, etc.), and make travel arrangements for when he comes home on breaks. Continue reading “Phoning Home: Reflections on Sunday Night Calls from College”