A dear blogger added me to his morning text list, every morning, when he should be getting another hour of sleep, he sends out a daily greeting to a list of friends and family. And I reply, when I wake up, sometimes after I am at work. Often with the selfie of the day. When I visited my sister she got to talking. After her husband died, one of his ex-es said we should stay in touch, you will need human contact, I will add you to my daily morning text messages. When I returned home, I added my sister to my morning list. It is simple and easy to do.
I send occasional, long chatty emails to people. A couple of bloggers are on my list, people I have gotten to know. Sometimes I get a short reply, sometimes a long reply, sometimes no reply. Really email is my favored way to communicate when we can't be in the same place.
A couple of years ago, I tried sending letters, you know paper, envelopes, and postage stamps. I put them on my goal list for the year. I enjoyed writing them. People indicated that they enjoyed receiving and reading them, but there were few if any responses in kind. I hate to think that letter writing is dead, but it is certainly an endangered art form.
I am not good at phone calls. I ran a telephone hotline for ten years. Over 12,000 times I answered the phone with "thank you for calling, please tell me all of your troubles" and I burned out. I cringe at the sound of a ringing phone. And honestly cell phones, smart phones, make lousy phones to hear and be heard on. After 15 years, maybe a good therapist could help me overcome this.
I was a latecomer to text messages. And I am still not a big text user. My sister lives on them, I check them maybe once or twice a day.
We are all to often alone in the tree, looking for contact, looking to reach out and touch someone. Send the text, send the email, make the call, meet someone for coffee or a drink. Do it this week, make a habit of it.
Your emailed tickled me!!!!! And I have been trying to be better about checking my email! LOL!!!!!
ReplyDeleteI should write more, and what else am I going to do after January?
DeleteI’m still best, everything is relative, at email. I use texting with friends for immediate conversations, so find texting too pressured for general contact. I always feel like I need to drop everything. I used to love letter-writing. Can’t remember the last time!
ReplyDeleteIt is so fun to hear from real people.
DeleteI like email the best of all the methods too.
ReplyDeleteI emailed someone last evening, and got a nice reply.
DeleteI have never sent a text message or received one. Last month, I hand-wrote a letter and sent it to a relative. It was the first handwritten letter I had sent in several years. I used to be handwriting every day but now that skill is getting rusty.
ReplyDeleteWe can keep the art form alive.
DeleteI miss letter writing and I agree that even if you send a letter you'll rarely get a written response.
ReplyDeleteI do text a bit, but that's just quick messages to Carlos or co-workers.
So email is the one for me, sadly.
I live on email, but I am looking forward to deleting my office email from my phone.
DeleteI'm on two different text group lists and we communicate back and forth on a daily basis. But, I must admit I do prefer talking so if my response is going to be a long one, I call.
ReplyDeleteI like talking, it is the phone that I need to get use to again.
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