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If you’re friends with me, there’s a good chance I haven’t replied to the last four text messages you’ve sent me. Nothing personal, I just physically cannot do it anymore. There’s just something about the painstaking task that makes my fingers numb. I find it futile, monotonous, lackluster, and a bunch of other degrading GRE words.
Texting always makes me feel like I have unfinished business. It’s something else I have to add to my to-do list. It’s gotten to the point that my unanswered texts are taken care of less often than my laundry or dishes. “Oh, when I get home from work I’ll probably make dinner, fold some clothes, answer my text messages.” It just seems so unnecessary.
Between social media, Pokemon Go, and a number of other apps, I’m already too distracted on my phone. But if I want to spend hours mindlessly scrolling through somewhat entertaining forums, that’s on me. No one else should hold the ability to keep me attached to my phone (besides my employer, because damn who doesn’t love a good work email at 9:00 p.m.). I don’t want to be picking up my phone every few minutes, rinse, and repeat just to answer your texts.
It brings me physical pain when things are done inefficiently. Not the most endearing trait to have, but you win some, you lose some. I’m constantly finding a way to save time in my 9 to 5 life and wasting minutes that slowly pile up on pointless one-to-two line messages is not a solid use of it.
I could have a three-minute phone call with all the details it takes to relay in 30 texts over the course of an hour. Sure, there are situations where texting is more ideal: if you need an answer to just one question, to send me an address or quick reminder, to tell me your Chipotle order, etc.
But please, for the love of all things good, if you want to know how my day was or what the plans are for our weekend trip, call me! I’ll tell you a funny story from work, where we’re meeting, what to pack, and we’ll be on with our lives in 10 minutes max. I’ll thank you, and so will my phone battery.
Texting is breeding a new generation of individuals that are legitimately scared of talking on the phone. I’ve seen some of my friends’ phones ring, go unanswered, and then they text that person immediately after. Like whaaaat just happened there? Did you forget the whole purpose of having a phone in the first place? Is there some problem with phone calls that no one told me about?
I understand texting can be appealing because it’s less personal, but it just brings so many unnecessary issues to the table that phone calls don’t. A simple sentence like “I never called you that” can have five different meanings depending on where the emphasis is placed and a text message can’t deliver the right meaning. Not to mention brevity or not replying sometimes being taken the wrong way.
I think I’ll just call everyone I have unanswered texts from and catch them off guard. Maybe they’ll even answer and I can shorten my to-do list. I can try to start a new trend: Make America Call Each Other Again. Here’s to a new, more personal, less texting world!.
Respond
k
K.
If you get numb fingers from something as inactive as texting, you should consult your doctor because you may have a serious heart condition
Reading this made me think of Drake’s lyrical masterpiece.
“You used to call me on my cell phone…”
I’m old school (in many ways) so in my opinion a quick phone conversation is much easier. With a text you can’t tell if someone is blatantly ignoring you or is actually busy.
Sounds like you get left out of a lot of things
Or I like concrete plans ahead of time and not wishy-washy shit that ends up in everyone sitting home all night?
The way I see it texting is for information, phone calls are for conversation. Send concise texts and get straight to the point all the time and it’s a total non-issue
I can’t wait to see what the next thing PGP complains about will be.
I was a bigger fan of texting until I realized you could accomplish what you wanted in a 2 minute phone call rather than an hour of texting
I’m confused.Why call someone on the phone when you can text them? Makes no sense.
Depending on text response time, you can shorten an hour long text conversion to a two minute phone call. Team phone call.
On the flipside, an hour of of phone tag can and anxiety can be completely eliminated by constraining menial conversations to text. My dad doesn’t text (60 year old blue collar guy with a complete ignorance of computers), so every time I miss his call he leaves a vague voicemail to call him back which makes me worried that somebody died.
I had to sit my mom down and explain to her that voicemails consisting of “Hi, it’s your mother. It’s x o’clock, call me back,” are literally handled by the missed call notification.
A subparsalesman would get exited when someone actually calls them back or picks up the phone.
Makes perfect sense now. I can roll with that then. Phone calls are okay in my book now.
I’m so sick of you. #boomroasted
Truth. As much as I hate talking on the phone, I really just want to wrap up conversations. Texting is the opposite of that. Mostly, I feel like when someone texts me, a clock starts ticking down for “respond and still be close,” “respond and still be a friend,” and “respond and still be a person that they think are okay.”