Texto

n. - text (message)
We continue to develop more and more sophisticated ways of communicating only so that we can actually communicate less. I am not a cell phone person. I always forget to turn it on, it scares me when it rings and annoys me if I’m somewhere other than home. I don’t like talking on it when I’m walking around and I absolutely loathe texting.

I minded the latter less when I had a blackberry since it was easier to type on the keyboard. The phone I have now, albeit the pinnacle of coolness, is hard for me to type on. It autocorrects to the point where if I’m not paying attention the message I type comes out as something completely different.

The other day, my husband and I were meeting a friend for lunch and we had the addresses mixed up on top of the fact that we changed to another restaurant across the street at the last minute. So there we were were texting back and forth, waiting and worrying and wondering until finally I picked up the phone and dialed my friend's number. That was so much easier. That way I could explain exactly where we were and how to get there.

Texting is a part of life worldwide, but I do believe the Europeans caught on to it first. I remember when another dear friend was going through a painful break-up while living in London and kept explaining the texts that she and her then boyfriend were sending to each other leaving room for confusion and miscommunication. I asked her one day, why don’t you just call him and talk to which she explained that everyone texted there.

I think texting, while at times I suppose is more convenient than a phone call, can also make a recipe for disaster. The other day, my brother-in-law texted me while I was out walking. Immediately flustered by the out of the blue message, I felt the need to respond right away. So while crossing the road and trying not to get hit by a car, I read the message quickly and responded.

As such, I misunderstood his message and my response set off a chain of events that now have to be undone. Basically he was asking if my husband had a certain video game (for our Wii), “est ce qu’il a le jeux…” Because I read it in a panic, I understood, “est ce qu’il jeux…” or is he playing the video game. So trying to be not just prompt, but witty to boot, I wrote back “Pas a ce moment ;)” – yes with the wink as well, meaning he’s not playing at the moment because he wasn’t since he was at work. Well, I finally realized after asking my husband why his brother would send me such a weird text message in the middle of the day that he was writing because he wanted to know what to get my husband for his birthday. I would like to add that to my husband’s birthday was three weeks ago already, so had the message been more timely, maybe I could have figured that out.

I texted back again in the evening to clarify things, since my husband actually has the game in question. Then my brother in law called, but since it was all supposed to be a secret, I couldn’t talk to him not to mention we were in the middle of dinner. I said we could talk later and hung up. But then he texted me again – in this case, texting is just as disruptive as talking. It turns out that he had understood my reply, rightfully so, to mean my husband didn’t have the game and had already ordered it. A simple call in the first place could have avoided this whole mess, saved time and avoided the mini fit against technology that I had as a result so another lesson learned – pick up the phone rather than just peck at it.