As I sat on my couch cuddled up with a blanket, and watching one of the many TV series that I am addicted to, my sister remarked with an air of the all knowing, “You know why love isn’t as awesome as it is in movies?”
“Why?” I asked as the characters on the screen gazed into each others eyes, almost going to kiss…and then dang it if the ambulance didn’t show up right then, with a guy who had been stabbed, causing the doctors to running around in a frenzy. You got to love hospital soap operas. One moment romance then the next, a bloody scene where they saw someone’s arm off.
“Because people don’t talk like that in person, they just text each other.” My sister said, referring to the movie moments where the two people meant-to-be together have an intense argument, then realize how much they love each other.
I thought about that today at the college as I realized about every second person had their phone out and was typing away.
It does seem people are more comfortable texting then actually talking to someone in person. Probably because it is instant and quick, (how else can we carry on conversations during class, with people who are inconveniently far away from us?) and gives us time to think of what to say.
But like all wonderful things, there are some down sides to texting. For one thing, our generation’s grammar and spelling has kind of gone downhill. Not to mention our annoying abbreviations for everything has brought the English language down a notch on the intelligence scale. I still can’t believe OMG and LOL have been added to the Oxford English Dictionary online.
Another downside is people can’t just sit and have a nice conversation with someone. They have to be having one or two other conversations at the same time, which is really irritating. People need to learn the art of focus and being in the moment.
In California there is a restaurant that offers a five per cent discount to customers who check in their phone before they eat. They said they wanted to create an environment where people could connect with each other.
I love that idea. Maybe this will catch on and people will actually start talking to one another instead of texting. And who knows? Maybe those magical arguing in the rain movie moments will happen in real life instead of texting back and forth late at night.