A Silent Call to Action

Before you slap the “old fogey” label on me, I beseech you to use your imagination to envision a time when the telephone was Communication King.  Just watch an episode of  “Mad Men” for examples of that gentler epoch before cell phones, email, GPS, Skype and a constellation of apps like Instagram and Snapchat.   Today, could Roger take clients for uninterrupted 8-martini lunches?  Could Don have kept his many affairs secret from his wives?

Such a peaceful time, when people could blithely and acceptably use the excuse, “I was away from the phone.”  When we could not be tracked and videotaped, 24/7.  But that’s not the subject of my blog today.  This is about a silent revolt, a desperate search for that nostalgic incommunicado era which has become a daily bone of contention for many, including myself.

As anyone who’s ever broken up with a lover knows, being ignored is worse than a verbal confrontation.  Silence is infinitely more painful than a firm ending.  The punishment of not knowing how the other person feels, what they’re thinking, wears on the psyche in interminable ways.  But haven’t you dealt the same to others, out of lethargy or uneasiness, without meaning to cause harm? 

I have friends and work associates who, in our many years of acquaintance, have never picked up the phone when I called them.  Not once.  A text or email gets a faster response, because that can be done at his or her own convenience.  I get it.   There are many recognized calls I let pass through to voice mail, secretly wishing they’d just text me instead.   On the other hand I have one friend, just one, who will only talk on the phone.  He doesn’t call just to say hello, he has a reason for calling.  He’ll answer texts and emails, but with a phone call.   So guess what?  I always pick up the phone when I see his name on the screen.   

But how should we regard the person to whom we have asked a legitimate question, or proposed a specific idea – but who chooses never to respond at all?  (Yes, it is a choice – your daily email and text barrage is no more aggressive than mine, and if it is – you should be managing it better!)  It eats away at us, this mysterious rebuke. 

No official protocol or Dear Abby rule applies here.  But we must realize that digitally ignoring someone communicates far more than the preposterous classic, “I’m far too busy to give you five seconds of my time.”  Actually, you’re telegraphing that you are a coward, afraid to have a personal conflict; or at the very least, you are rude and narcissistic.  Now that I have used the term “telegraphing” you may call me a curmudgeon.