the look

Today I got a look. One of those inter-generational, ‘I don’t understand you, you crazy old person’ looks. Sigh. It’s all about the mobile phones. And the text messages. Until today, I didn’t know how to send one. Actually I had sent one before. From my ex-workmate’s phone. Accidently informing the recipient that we were “in Ringworm” (I meant Ringwood). A mistake easily made, I would offer in my defence. Anyway, it’s not really germane to today’s events. I wasn’t paying enough attention to the process to remember the steps.
So, I had to send a message to a person regarding a work issue and they had requested that any contact be made via SMS. Fine. But I don’t know how to send an SMS. “Do you?” I ask my cubicle mate. “No”, she says. “I don’t know either”, volunteers my boss from the office next door, before I even get a chance to ask. Hmmmm, some quick PD in SMSing needed to be arranged for our entire section. Bring in the ‘young person’.
“Don’t you have a mobile phone?” she asks.
“No”, I reply.
“But how do you talk to your friends?”
“I use one of those,” I say, indicating ye olde fashioned land line.
“But what if you’re running late, how do you let them know?” Looks at me, puzzled.
“They wait,” I say. (And complain bitterly and at length later.) BUT they still wait. (Actually when discussing this later we decided I should have replied something along the lines of “I make my horse go faster”. But never mind.)
Then comes the look. It was withering. It clearly stated that I was ill equipped to cope in the modern world. That I was old, weird and possibly lived under a rock. Following on from the LOOK came a big sigh. “These people must be humoured,” it said. “But I don’t know why I bother.”
However, one quick lesson later and I subsequently successfully sent my first fully self composed SMS. (Even if I did have to be talked out of beginning it with “Dear XXXX” and signing off with a “Yours sincerely”. As my boss pointed out – “Even I know SMSes need to be short and to the point!”)