A strange and what seemed at first to be an eerie coincidence occurred on Twitter the other night. I checked in at Hootsuite, as I too often do, where I have several saved searches for all things related to payphones. I was surprised to see a picture of a familiar looking person at a very familiar payphone. Twitter user Daphnemcw posted this black and white photo of a woman using one of the few remaining payphones at Rockefeller Center.
A woman using a pay phone #retro pic.twitter.com/JFjuzr1R6G
— Daphne ♈ (@Daphnemcw) December 10, 2016
I have photographed this woman using this payphone. Honestly my first thought upon seeing this was that someone had stolen my picture. I only remembered taking one picture of the woman at the payphone. But so familiar to me were her posture and clothing that I thought I might have taken others, and that this was one of them.
I quickly vanquished that notion when I turned up this and only this photo.
@Daphnemcw I’ve seen that woman! https://t.co/2UdMtE4A5Q
Those Rockefeller Center payphones actually get decent usage. pic.twitter.com/IVnnpP3Vq9— Payphone Project (@payphonenews) December 11, 2016
Still, it was strange how she appeared to be standing on the exact spot, assuming the same posture, wearing the same clothing, and using the same payphone as in my picture. Was it possible that Daphne and I (who do not know each other) had photographed this woman at the exact same moment?
I started looking for the image of myself among the dozen or so people in the background of her picture when the answer came back. Daphne’s shot was from last week. Mine was from March of last year. Evidently this woman just likes to use this payphone, or perhaps likes to look like she’s using it.
Rockefeller Center used to have well over 100 phone booths and payphones throughout the underground concourse. Some of my only genuinely positive memories of using phone booths in New York were at Rockefeller Center in the early 1990s. Their booths seemed different from most because they were actually well ventilated and I think I remember at least some of the seats being cushioned. That made them somewhat more comfortable than most booths with metal seats. The memory of the cushioned seats might be stretching itself to suit the desired sentiment. But unlike most phone booths, which felt like coffins to me, there was something airy and inviting about the booths at Rockefeller Center in the early 1990s.
The last phone booths of Rockefeller Center were removed in January, 2009. This photo of them, taken not long before their removal, shows they had no seats at all:
