Telephone Game

by Dresden Shumaker on April 3, 2012

shoebox card for busy moms

Allow me to share with you a dramatic interpretation of how phone calls with friends often go:

{RING of cell phone}
Me: {leaping across two monster trucks, a pile of plastic blocks and abandoned sippy cups} Where is Mama’s phone?
{W begins to “help” me look and starts collecting our bajillion tv remotes and driving them to me…}
W: vrooooooom!!
{RING of cell phone continues}
Me: Hold on Mama needs to hear the phone ringing.
W: Raaaaaace Cars!!!!
{phone stops ringing}
{I locate my cell phone.}

I duck into the kitchen to escape the sound of W’s impromptu monster truck rally. I press the voicemail button and JUST as the caller begins their message…
W: MAMAAAAA!! Where are you?? MAAAAAA-MAAAAAAAA!!!!!

The message goes unheard.

I retreat to the den and as W drives a bulldozer over my legs I tab over to the e-mail/twitter/text area of my cell phone and type the following message:

“Hi! Can’t really talk on the phone. What’s up?”

And then I cross fingers that my friend is online so I can connect.

There is something you should know, however, as much as this modern day phone angst plays out and I groan and sigh about it, I actually really hate talking on the phone. Once upon a time I was a receptionist for a busy production company in California. That job led to my next job as a director’s assistant. Both jobs required me to answer the phone all day. When I was a receptionist I answered hundreds of called from 9am – 7pm. When I started working for the director I had to be available to take HIS call 24/7.

Something about those 7 years of phone attachment created a person that wants nothing to do with talking on a phone. At all.

If you need to “talk” I talk infinitely better with written words. I write the way I talk (at least I think I do) and I like being able to pause and mull on something before responding.

That being said, there are moments where I simply MUST talk to an adult. W is becoming a wonderful chatterbox, but it can be exhausting. Luckily I have friends that hate the phone as much as I do so when one of us calls we don’t linger. A great friend chat can be had in under 5 minutes. For real.

So my phone hating secret is now out. Are you a phone person or an e-mail/text person?

{ 39 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Jennifer April 3, 2012 at 10:41 am

I work in a call center but dont consider myself much of a phone person. Actually, i’m rather ambivelent about phones overall. I talk to my mom probably the most on the phone, I rarely talk to my spouse over the phone (see him enough in person). But since I take inbound calls all day (very targeted, mostly boring calls), I dont run home to talk on the phone. However, I love this day and age of my smart phone. I can leave my desk and headphones and computer and go *over there* (whereever I want) and either play a game, or call someone, or check my email, or send a text. I find that super duper awesome. Iphones rock.
Lame reply, sorry.

Telephone Game

Allow me to share with you a dramatic interpretation of how phone calls with friends often go:

So my phone hating secret is now out. Are you a phone person or an e-mail/text person?

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