The Dead Zone

How the local graveyard became my new home office

- RICK BRAGG,JOHN CUNEO

I LOVE THOSE commercials, bankrolled by the telecommunications giants, about how far we have come in our technology. Cell phone towers rise from the pines. Satellites glide among the stars.

They hire healthy-looking, neatly dressed young people to tell us that they have linked up the world to all points of itself. They show us maps to back it up. If you believe their graphics, there is not one dead spot, not a single cone of silence, in the entire United States.

These people lie. I live in the country. I know better.

Out here, my smartphone is useless, unless you need something to balance a wobbly table or throw at a mean cat. It has a nice heft to it; you might could even use it to drive a nail.

But it is not good for talking—or listening. I am told it has to do with something called “bars.”

Trouble is, out here, there ain’t none.