File photo of cell phones. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

Using the treadmill during one of my recent cardio workouts, I glanced around my gym and saw easily 50 gym rats of all ages on their cellphones, texting or checking messages. They were engaged in no conversations with any other gym buddies or those sharing nearby equipment and their phones were rarely put away.

At first, I was astounded, but then I thought, “Why should I be surprised?” Cell phones rule our work, workouts and personal lives, and even make their way into our bedrooms. I’ll leave things at that since this is a family column.

But I had to chuckle when I recently found my wife’s anniversary card, which showed a husband and wife saying goodnight to each other while the wife continued on with her cell phone game while the husband was snoring. My lovely wife of 56 years loved the card and read it while she was lying in bed trying to win a game of solitaire on her phone.

My favorite cell phone line at meetings these days is, “Will you excuse me, I have to take this.” I’ve been guilty of this behavior myself, so I’m not being critical, but the behavior has become so common, we don’t think twice about the rudeness of interrupting a meeting while we step into the hall to take a call from a spouse or partner or one of our kids, who seem to have no real sense of work boundaries.

Fortunately, a few folks have learned to silence their phones during business hours, leaving important callers only the office number. The callers know that unless there is a major emergency, cell phones are off limits.

Even worse, there has been an increasing epidemic of cell phone use in schools and classes. While this is not a new problem, since the easing of COVID restrictions, we’re seeing more blatant disregard for common courtesy in classrooms and disrespect to teachers who are trying to get students to finish daily lessons. When teachers try to remove phones from student possession for the remainder of the school day, we often face belligerent attitudes and feeble excuses like, “I have to know when my mom is picking me up after school for a medical appointment,” or “I forgot my lunch and my mom is bringing it over.”

And those are only a few of the excuses. The list is endless.

Another challenge with cell phones these days is the noise level, especially in public places like supermarkets where users continue conversations in checkout lines or restaurants where cellphone users try to keep conversations above the sounds of conversation and clinking dishes and are almost yelling. Some folks even talk in theaters up to the time a performance begins and that is annoying. If a call comes through for me and I need to receive it, I will always try to leave any public venue for a few minutes.

One of my favorite series, “Hallmark Movies and Mysteries,” does a great job of portraying couples in unraveling relationships, where the two partners are out for dinner and one continues to take business calls while they’re trying to have a normal conversation. On one program, when the guy paused from his endless calls, his girlfriend told him the relationship was just not working out and ended it.

He looked up and said, “Wait, are you breaking up with me?” Then he promptly took another call as the young lady quietly whispered, “Yes,” and left.

Like many other seniors who are beginning to have some hearing loss, I try to be sensitive to talking too loud. My wife is great at reminding me that I’m not all alone out in some field and to keep it down. It’s taken me a long time to accept that the technology enables us to speak in low tones because the person at the other end can generally hear very well if our volume of voice is normal.

So, how did we get here? How has the “clunky” looking device that resembled a small boot — that I helped introduce with Motorola in 1973 — turned into this technological nightmare that rules our lives? The only answers I can think of are convenience and instant communication.

Being able to reach anyone while walking down a busy street or driving was nothing short of miraculous when the first cell phone arrived. Then technology gurus added packages of data and ways to synchronize our emails and texting, which I believe has become the bane of cell phone use. Now we can access just about anything and sadly we are vulnerable to just about anyone who wants to threaten, hack or disturb us. And few secrets are safe anymore.

Love them or leave them, cell phones are not going away. But public establishments, schools and parents can still put rules in place that will set boundaries for usage. And all of us can be more careful about misuse of texts and other kinds of intrusions.

Steven Gaynes is a Fairfield writer, and his “In the Suburbs” appears each Friday. He can be reached at stevengaynes44@gmail.com.