So many messages, so little time to listen and answer. So many ways to communicate, so few real connections.
It’s been a frustrating week trying to schedule interviews, receive feedback, even reach friends for fun plans. I’ve had time to work, which for me is usually writing, but without receiving the information I need, there’s nothing to write about. I can fiddle-fart around to some extent, researching and preparing, but sooner or later I face the void. Time hanging, like a cage dangling.
I don’t dare make plans. For example, my neighbor just asked me to go for coffee, but as soon as I do, someone will call or email needing a reply and the cage will clank shut.
Even going to a meeting at one of the most hi-techie companies around is not without its glitches. Here we are talking about a breakthrough product in communications, how it’s going to be exhibited at all the conventions, the project manager wound up like robot on speed. The poor people setting up the demo are struggling to catch up. They drove all the way down from L.A. the night before and arrived at the building early so they could be ready before the meeting. Someone was supposed to let them into the conference room. But no one came down, no one called, and we stood in the lobby waiting. I used the time to talk face-to-face, learning something about the product I needed to know.
Finally the manager arrived, all flustered, and we followed her into the meeting room. Apologies. “Someone was supposed to tell me you were here.” Who, I wondered. Who didn’t call whom? We all have cell phones and some have more than one.
I love my iPhone and need to upgrade soon. I have a dinosaur model and most of the time it works well, except when I leave it in another room, but that is not the phone’s fault. All my friends and family who have upgraded have had problems: phone calls going to the computer instead of the phone, contacts disappearing, ring tones fading away. It took me several days to reach one friend. She wasn’t getting my messages on her phone, nor was I getting hers. She blamed it on her upgrade. It’s true we are older, but we are not that technologically challenged.
The corker this week was a call from my sister. I was so happy to see her name light up on my phone, missing her after a visit 3,000 miles away. I can tell her about my week! Get some sympathy.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said. “I butt dialed you by accident. I’m trying to clean up a mess. I reached up in my pantry for a bag of flour and spilled it on everything. There are poufs of white everywhere!” I tried to imagine how the poufs involved her butt and iPhone.
This was not the first time she’s pocket or purse dialed me. More than once, I’ve answered a call from her, said hello, and then listened to her and one of her daughters out somewhere, like in a store Christmas shopping, discussing what to get people.
I know what I want for Christmas, and the new year. To go back to the days when my sister and I used tin cans and a string in our grandmother’s garden.
head wind journal 