This is one of those things I’ve been meaning to write about, but I’ve been lazy lately. (Read: busy with un-fun things.) “E”, in this case, is not the drug Ecstasy, but “E” as in “Email” and “E-“ anything else electronically communicable.
Two incidents prompt me to speak up. The first was my posting of a “Retweet” on Twitter recently. My cyber pal George posted that it was his birthday, further explaining that he has been “clean and sober for two years.” It wasn’t his actual birthday, you see, but for a recovering addict, a launch into sobriety holds as much importance. Instead of replying to George, I re-tweeted his joy, prefacing it with my own congratulations.
Now, my “tweets” are set up to post to my Facebook page. Soon, I received a FB message that a friend of mine was wishing me happy birthday and congratulations (on my sobriety, of course!) I’d forgotten, of course, that not all FB folks are Twitterers, and therefore do not understand the brief “RT” in the message as being a “forward” of someone else’s words. Oops.
The other incident is much more troubling. I sent an email to a very dear friend, asking about an upcoming charitable event we were sharing. She didn’t respond for some time (weeks). When she did write me, she ignored my email and her words seemed to convey a disconnect with me with regard to my participation in the event. Stunned, I waited a couple of days to answer, then wrote her a long, heartfelt response. More weeks passed, and I felt horrible over the whole affair. Sadly, I did disconnect myself from the event. I eventually decided I would call my friend, but before I could, that very day she called me.
My friend was in tears. She’d discovered I’d removed myself, couldn’t understand why. So what happened? She changed email addresses. None of my emails reached her. Instead of hitting “reply” to her email, I started fresh, using her old email address. Sounds pretty simple, but the repercussions were horrendous and heartbreaking. I should have picked up the phone when I didn’t hear from her the first time. Should have picked up the phone when she wrote me and I misconstrued her words. Shoulda, coulda, woulda.
Oh, the perils of cyberspace. Be warned.