Harry Avant wrote:

I checked the box where the phone lines come to the house and it
doesn't have any place to plug in a phone. The lines and box are about
40 years old. Maybe when the tech gets here he can install a more
modern device.

It would be an excellent idea to insist on it.

Your problem is called "ring trip". It is almost
certainly caused by a wet junction box, which causes
corrosion to grow between terminals of a cable pair.
The corrosion breaks down under the high voltage from
ringing current, which conducts just enough that the
telco switch thinks the line has gone off hook (i.e., it
has been answered). That causes the ring voltage to be
dropped immediately.

If you had a proper interface you would be able to very
easily check whether the problem is from your house
wiring, or not. You'll want to remember that the reason
you cannot is because *they* have not installed a proper
interface. If this problem does turn out to be your
house wiring and they want to bill you for the time they
spent, refuse to pay *because* they did not have the
proper interface.

Most likely it is not in your house wiring, and instead
someone left one of their junction boxes slightly ajar
and a bit of rain water leaked in. They'll find it and
fix it.

--
Floyd L. Davidson http://www.apaflo.com/floyd_davidson
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska)