Real men don’t text!

I met a nice guy at a party not that long ago. We talked for over an hour, exchanged info and he texted several days later. The texts went back and forth 3 or 4 times and then…nothing. I was the last one to text. Ouch.

To be completely honest, I was more perplexed than disappointed.

This is not the first time this has happened so it left me wondering: Am I a bad texter? Do I have some kind of texting etiquette deficiency? WTF? I’m starting to develop a complex.

My first thought was that it must’ve been something I said. So I went back into the texts to see where I might’ve gone wrong. I did make a sarcastic joke in one of the last texts…maybe he didn’t find it funny?

And then I checked myself and thought “seriously, how off putting could I have been on a 4^th text?!” If that was the reason I’m clearly better off without him. But I wondered how different it would've been if he would've just called.

Which brings me to the question of the day… When did making a phone call become such a big deal?

I thought guys were all about instant gratification? I mean, I get that it’s helpful for a quick update or when you can’t talk. But as the primary method of communicating? Not a fan. Especially when you first meet someone.

Call me old school, but I think the phone call deserves a Robert Downey Jr. kind of comeback.

Yes, it’s typically awkward at first, but at least you get that initial layer of ice out of the way and jump right in to the thing that got you exchanging numbers in the first place…getting to know each other!

I see the appeal with texting in getting to think about and edit your response. But when you’re initially getting to know someone you have no foundation with, can you really gauge chemistry from texts?

As a culture, we’re all about efficiency, yet I’ve found things to be so much more complicated over text. What takes 5 min of back and forth texting would take 10-20 seconds over the phone. I don’t get it. Is it just me?

It seems in general we have an innate ability to assume and misinterpret things. It’s challenging enough dealing with the consequences of that when we’re communicating face to face.

Take away voice, tone, and all the other elements of expression that allow us to read a person’s intention. We’re essentially left guessing and it becomes a complete crapshoot. So much can get lost in translation.

If a guy picks up the phone to call me there are three things I immediately credit in his favor:

1- he’s definitely interested and aggressive enough to make moves

2- he’s confident enough to have a conversation 

3- he’s chivalrous

I believe real men have a voice and know how to use it. It's attractive. 

My guess is that this person was “just not that into me” or maybe he decided I wasn’t his type or maybe he dropped his phone in the toilet and lost my number forever. At the end of the day, it’s always just a guess.

I’ve stopped worrying about why people do what they do. I can only control what I do. And I will continue to encourage good ol’ fashioned phone conversation with any guy I meet because I want a relationship with someone who doesn’t want to limit the conversation to 160 characters.

(Yes, I have a ghetto phone that only allows me to text 160 characters at a time. Waiting on the new iphone!)