Regular readers of The Rittenhouse Review and TRR know, or might at least be vaguely aware, that before I moved to Philadelphia I lived for several years in New York. I left Manhattan nearly two years now (though I’ve not yet been in Philadelphia for a year -- a mysterious gap there, in case you didn’t catch it), and as I much as I love New York, I can’t say I miss it all that much.

I’ve made my break from New York gradually and not always consciously: by not renewing certain magazine subscriptions, by falling out of touch with friends and colleagues (and they likewise), by checking in at the web sites of New York Post and the New York Daily News with diminishing frequency, and by caring less and less about the latest derangements of Mayor Michael “Wow! Am I out of my league, or what?” Bloomberg (R).

The final break, for I can think of nothing else to break anymore, came today, when I bought a new cell phone and got a new cell phone number.

For two years, despite leaving New York, I had been relying upon my longstanding “917” cell phone number for reasons both professional and personal. But it’s gone now. And my new cell phone number screams “Philadelphia!”

How so? Well, the pleasant fellow at the cellular-phone shop, apparently having sized me up pretty well during our encounter, didn’t even try to pawn off one of those stupid new “267” numbers on me.

Thus, my brand new Philadelphia cell phone number, just like my still fairly new Philadelphia home phone number, begins with the venerable and cherished area code, 215.

And that’s a simple fact -- a small thing, if you will -- that makes this rather old-fashioned, increasingly cranky, and persistently neurotic man very, very happy.