You've been X'd by Text

I love my mobile phone. For someone who didn’t really want one, I have to say purchasing one just as the new camera models were coming out, was one of my better ideas.

If I’ve forgotten to add something on the grocery list and need to call my husband, it’s there. If I need to let someone know I’m caught in traffic, it’s handy, and most importantly if my husband (trash picker that he is) wants to bring something home with him, he can send me a snap for approval before he lugs it home only to receive a Caesarean thumbs down.

I particularly love texting because there are times when I need to get a message across but don’t have the time to call, (I usually use this to relay footie scores when I’m watching Chelsea matches and my husband’s at work.)

Lately however, the text has been taken to a new level. I knew it was coming, I’d heard about people in the UK being sacked via text and a woman in India who informed that her husband was divorcing her via text but I didn’t think it would happen to me....until it did.

The first one came when I returned from vacation. I’d been roped into attending a recruitment meeting in Orlando in May and I wasn’t pleased about going.

I know, I know! Some of you love the whole Disney experience and even as adults would relish visiting Disney World. I, am not one of those people. It’s got at least three things I hate, cutesy wutsey, crowds and children. If it wasn’t for Pooh, I’d skip through the park, spreading kudzu seeds everywhere in the hopes the vine grew at a miraculous rate and choke the life out of all and sundry.
But I digress.

The only thing I was looking forward to was seeing my mate and hoping to spend the long sunny afternoons trying to forget about the corporate schmoozing I’d be forced to do from 7:30-3 each day. Those plans were scratched by a terse text indicating that courtesy of a cool film opportunity that had come his way, that he’d be out of the country when I was in town. I sat there staring at the words, not quite able to fathom the idea of me, completely alone, smack dab in the middle of a Mickey Mouse operation.

I felt like texting back URRRRGHHH!!!

A few days later I texted my trainer to let him know I was looking forward to returning to the gym after my holiday when I received a return text about him needing to see me.

"Don’t worry," I replied, "I ate healthfully didn’t drink much, ran up and down the stairs that are the streets of Valetta in Malta." Long story short, I wasn’t quite the wreck you’d expect someone to be after a sybaritic holiday. His return text informed me that he had accepted a real job as a computer programmer and would no longer be my trainer. Four years, and I get dumped via text!?!

Yes I know it’s easy to text but when the news is particularly good or devastatingly bad, I prefer to have a human voice relay it. I want to hear a voice filled with sadness, tinged with regret or even gurgling with allergy season mucus. Instead I got to read cold words on a grey screen, all the while adding my own paranoid subtext.

I mean if reading a text was so great, why would satellite navigation systems, phone companies and advertising groups spend millions to soothe you with the dulcet tones of Bacall, James Earl Jones and Thom Baker (my favorite Dr. Who). I shouldn’t be surprised, they were both men. Isn’t it de rigeur, that they think not of the woman who they were disappointing, but of their own comfort. I still agree that text is great for quick, “meet ya at 7:30” or “We need OJ” but I implore you, even if you’re bereft of time, send a MMS (Multi-Media Message) so if you’re going to tell me to F ** off, I can hear it in your own sweet voice.