April 21, 2005
Text Me
Jill Brooks, INtake columnist

I typically remain five years behind the technologically enlightened. I still write in journals, own stacks and stacks of legal pads, and last week I couldn’t open my new laptop because it was backwards. For years I refused to buy a cellular phone because I didn’t like the idea of being so easily “tracked down.” That changed after getting lost, alone, in a bad section of Cleveland. I was rushing to see the “tip off” of the Tragically Hip concert. I didn’t realize my purse was back at the hotel until I noticed the gaslight on my car read ‘empty’. I flagged down a cab driver, borrowed five dollars for gas, and surrendered to purchasing a cell phone upon my return to Indy. These stories make my parents shudder.

The current state of affairs of my technological befuddlement lies with text messaging. I do send an occasional text message, but nothing imperative has ever come out in one. At the top of my game I may write, “Miss you” to a friend, though I’d still rather call. And I’m completely perplexed by people who take the time to write, “Call me!”

‘Texting’ (a new verb) is Morse code prose in the poetry of life. Can anyone properly wordsmith while blending vowels and consonants with one’s thumbs?

My good friend has a friend who is a relentless ‘text messager’ (new noun). When I’m with my friend, trifle text messages stream in ad nauseam, and no hour of the day or night is safe from the jingling tone saying: This just in! Text messages are merely a precursor to anything remotely interesting, and like my best friend says, “Interesting will get you in the door, but it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re staying for dinner.”

A modern SAT question may read something like this: People possibly needing a hobby are to text messaging as middle school children are to what? Note passing, that’s what. Text messaging is great form of flirtation, just as note passing was in seventh grade. A former boyfriend ‘text messaged’ (slang, past tense) me last week and I must admit I felt a little giddy. After his third text came in I thought, “All right, enough. Call me”. But I didn’t text “Call me” because, you see, that time and energy would have been ridiculous! Much like Instant Messaging (a form of being), someone must know when to quit. One of you must accept, without hurt feelings, that “Goodbye” means “At this time, I will not be writing anything else.”