Telephone, tell a friend, text a message…

I am going to be 52 in a few weeks. I’m not young but I’m also not ready for assisted living, if that helps paint a picture. When I was growing up, the best way to communicate with friends was by telephone if I wasn’t at school or over at a friend’s house. My junior high school was 45 minutes across town by bus and it was important for us to communicate about homework, our classes and, of course, boys we liked. Friends’ advice was golden. We’d also arrange weekend get-togethers. And, remember, there were no computers or smart phones so the rotary dial telephone was “it.” With out-of-town friends, we used (drum roll, please) the U.S. Mail to send cards and letters. Sounds like the Stone-Age, you say?

We had one phone line so after about an hour on the phone talking to friends, my mom or dad would remind me that I was one of four people in the house and someone else might like to use the phone.

Today we have smart phones. I store my entire address book inside, including mailing and email addresses. I program speed dial numbers so with the press of one or two buttons, I can make a call.

Why, then, do most friends, family and even co-workers communicate by text? It blows my mind. We as a society have chosen to look-up the “contact” in our address book and type in a text message that, with a swooping sound (at least that’s the one I’ve chosen), leaves our phone and is “delivered.” Then, when the person we’ve texted notices our message, they text back. My phone shows a “…” to indicate that my friend is typing a response. And, I wait to see what it says. Why is this easier than just picking up the phone and calling a person?

When I talk to a friend by phone, our personalities are expressed with pauses, voice inflections, laughs or gasps. There are none of these non-verbal cues when texting. I’ve had to learn a new language of abbreviations, such as “lol,” “idk” or “brb”. There are also less politically correct exclamations like “omg” or “wtf” that somehow make swearing more acceptable, although I still can’t bring myself to send the latter.

Being an English/Journalism major and business person, I’m trained to communicate in complete sentences. It’s stressful when I try and abbreviate words or, better yet, auto-correct changes my tongue-in-cheek “Birthday Pahty” message to “Birthday Panty.”

I’ve had entire texted conversations, over a 15- or 20-minute period, that could have easily been discussed in a simple 3-minute phone call. But, somehow a text conversation is less intrusive at the dinner table or family gathering? Not to mention driving. With hands-free devices, it’s easier than ever to talk and drive without crashing into inanimate objects. Why do people insist on texting and driving, which to do successfully requires four hands and four eyes (with at least two on the road).

Voice messaging used to be popular as well. Now, it’s common to look at your phone’s caller ID and call the person back, never listening to the actual message. And, if you call a person’s phone more than once, you’re “blowing up” his or her phone. If I do leave a detailed message with time and date information, I usually end up texting that same information to the person or giving it to them when we talk, which is the rarity.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m catching on to texting and am having fun with it. Just as the computer will never replace the sincerity of a hand-written note or message, texting will never replace, for me, the warmth and care of a one-hour phone conversation.

Let’s talk!