A collision of communications

I just realized I'm out of step with most people around me. Okay, I know, I know, that I actually figured out when I was about 5 in PE class. But this isn't about my having to learn to ride a bike twice, this is about communication.

I'm here to tell you: my name is Attila and I hate texting.

Hate it. As in a level of loathing I rarely feel for a method of communication. Email, phone conversations, instant messaging, F2F conversations, I'm all okay with, mostly. Texting? Nope. Abhor it with white hot heat of a thousand suns.

Okay, that's hyperbolic, but I'm trying to make a point here.

It's like all the negatives of emails (no ability to read inflections, bad spelling and grammar, and summary to the point of being unclear) with all the negatives of phone calls (intrusive, and okay, that's all I got, intrusive.)  All on a teeny keyboard that tells the world I wasted all those months in 9th grade touch typing class. So much for my hard-earned WPM count which isn't much to brag about, but is much higher than my WPM count when using only my thumbs. And texting isn't really all that great for conversations, or at least not the conversations I like to have. And you have to pay for them, too! Where's the upside?

I've tried, I really have tried. But despite being an early and avid adopter of a lot of methods of electronic communication, this one isn't it for me.

I text. Rarely. I text my sister when I have something of limited importance that doesn't require much explanation and know I'll forget it if I wait til a time when my time zone and her time zone and my work schedule and her work schedule coincide for a conversation. I text her on weekends to say "are you free to talk now?" But she refuses to read email more than once a week, she hates using computers for non-work stuff, and the scheduling differentials on weekdays preclude phone calls, and so I'm stuck. Text for quick stuff, voice mail for longer. I'm okay with that use of texting. Once every couple of weeks, no problem.

Note: Big Sis has an email account. She doesn't like email. I respect her lack of love for that communication method, though it's one of my favorites. So I don't use it to initiate contact. Ever. See where I'm going with that?

Big Bro is pretty much the same, only I'm honor bound as a little sister to occasionally irritate him so I do--rarely--initiate contact via email. Plus he's never really flat out said he hates email, and Big Sis has, so maybe it's not quite the same.

I could go on and on and on. And frequently do, but that's another reason I don't like texting. But I won't. I'll just ask you: if you're not Big Sis or Big Bro who have way too many blackmail-worthy stories of my childhood for me to get too snarky with them, if there's any other reasonable way to get my attention for information that needs to be imparted either direction or for a conversation, could you maybe try that?

I, my thumbs, and my phone bill thank you.