Stopped at a payphone last month and realized I had no idea how to use it

Tessa Taylor · 2026-06-27T14:10:03.699331+00:00

Last month I was walking through downtown Portland and spotted one of those old payphones still standing near a bus stop. My mom used to dial our home number from those things every time we moved to a new town, and now I stared at it like it was a alien artifact. Has anyone else run into old tech that made you feel like you time traveled or am I just getting old?

drewr152mo ago

Man I feel this so hard. It's wild how fast things change.

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aaron_mitchell2mo ago

@drewr15 hit it right. The funny thing about those payphones is they used to be everywhere, but now if you actually found one that works you'd probably have to call someone to ask how to use it. That's the part people forget - even if you figured out the coin slot and receiver, you'd still need a phone number memorized or a calling card. My buddy back in 2018 tried to call his girlfriend from a retro payphone at a museum and got stuck because he didn't know you had to wait for the dial tone first. Thirty seconds of just holding the handset to his ear before an old janitor walked by and told him.

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angelarivera2mo ago

Hold up, a janitor had to tell a grown man how to use a payphone? That's both funny and kinda sad at the same time.

3