Textual Healing
Sunday, 10 April 2011
It’s no secret that twitter, facebook, gchat, text messaging has complicated dating life. Not only has it been a source of my biggest regrets and insecurities in my dating habits, but texturisms have become yet another reason to not like someone. Do they LOL? Cut. Do they have poor texting grammar? Cut. Do they have poor BBM etiquette? Cut (that little unreplied ‘r’ is enough to make ANYONE crazy, okay?).
Text messaging has become a such a dominating factor in dating antics that we are starting to shy away from all things personal, clinging to the casual. Rejection, a thing we are all so completely terrified of, just doesn’t sting as much when it comes in the digital form. You don’t have to look the person in the eyes and see that they feel nothing for you. You don’t have to show to them that your eyes are welling up. Disappointment and devastation are so nicely hidden behind that little screen. All you have to do is read the words, and you can choose whether or not you really hear them.
After all this casual, there becomes a certain point in your life where tweeting, texting, facebooking, and gchatting becomes just too much and all you want is to have things go back to their simple days. JUST CALL ME.
Seriously. A phone call has become the equivalent of a man laying down a coat on a rain puddle. It never happens. A call speaks volumes and leaves nothing up to misinterpretation. You need not follow sarcastic comments or jokes with a wink emoticon or even worse…. the LOL. It’s a way for you to tell me you really like me, in such a simple way.
But that’s just the point. We live in a noncommittal casual time, where the reason why no one calls is precisely that. We just don’t know anymore, so how can we let the other person know? With all the mixed signal, games and increased confusion, we can no longer interpret one another. We have the three day rule, the bbm rule, the facebook rule but all these really amount to is everyone just trying to play it cool, keep it casual.
WIND mobile and the movie Textuality (hits theatres on April 22nd) asked a few of us to talk about how texting has affected our dating lives, and we came up with a list of dos and don’ts that will make all of our lives easier, if we choose to obey . And as long as you promise to play nice, and to follow these rules, I am willing to reward you. (Also, guess which ones were me….)
I am going to be an enabler. I’m giving away a BlackBerry® Bold™ 9780 with two free months of WIND Mobile services for you to call, not text, to arrange that second date. The phone is perfectly designed for that next morning text to let her know you are thinking of her, as so long as you don’t text her that late night “hey”, in hopes she will spend the night. At least not until you’re willing to hold her hand the next morning. When you read that bbm message? Know that he sees that little r, and reply back in a timely fashion.
All you need to do is comment below or follow me on twitter and Tweet to enter to win with a simple: Tweet
“I would love a free @WINDMobile @BlackBerry Bold from @unbrelievable http://bit.ly/hvXK3y”
Winner will be announced on Wednesday, April 13th.
