A girl, a crush and a phone

As I left for office yesterday, It felt like the day before. Or the day before it. Or the day before the day before. My companion for the day, the laptop tucked in, the handkerchief to give sinus company and the identity card to help my company “authenticate” me before entering “their” campus. 100 re. for food. A good 10 minutes before the cab would arrive, I was on road. Yet, something felt incomplete. And then it dawned, I had forgotten my phone at home.

               Two years ago, I treaded the same path to catch my college bus. And as soon as I stepped away from the glare of my mom who would anxiously remind me about the 15 re .(Yes, that is how much I carried to college everyday) still lying on the table or the handkerchief I would slowly slip the mobile out. And look into it all the way till I reached college.

7.30: Good morning 

              And wait for the next few seconds staring at the phone. Has she not started yet? Why did not she reply? Should I reply back asking whatsup! Or does she not have balance? OR Is she angry? Did I tell something yesterday to upset her?  As if her world depended on me!

7.33: Ain’t the weather like you? Teasing and threatening to pour with a little prod! Whats up!

              And I press the button SEND instinctively. Sometimes a reply would come within the next 30 secs. Sometimes 40.  A second more and I would go back to sent items to check if I sent something offensive. Something stupid was acceptable. Or was she busy with someone else? Did I show my desperation to talk by texting a minute earlier? How much longer should I wait.

              Every SMS might have had a maximum limit of only 150 characters and costed at most 10 paise. (I was clever enough to never text on holidays!) But, it costed me a lot more thoughts, a lot more time. They say love happens at first sight. Sometimes, love happens over the first SMS. And most crushes after the first conversation. After half a decade of exhausting my free messaging limit, perhaps it is time to reflect on how texts affected me and how different it is from other mediums of communication and kadallai putting.  

              The beauty of texting is the intimacy in the conversations.  That extra second to digest a message and feel it before replying back.  That second when your crush sets your heart aflutter with a brilliant bit of wordplay to tease you. When you know you made her smile even if it is at the cost of making you look stupid.  Back in the days of failing internet, telephone was never a great option. However hard the poets might have tried to romanticize silence, middle class economics surely rubbished the theory. With a phone, there was a fear of dad asking, “Yaaru pa avallavu nerram phone le!” (Dai, who is it on phone for so long!). A fear of the balance getting exhausted before the phone’s charge drained out. And most importantly, the pressure to initiate a new topic.  When you are texting, there is that extra second to reply to that conversation killer, “LOL!”, “hmmmm” with something better! Something to keep her talking.  To dream about the tone of her replies. To wonder if she indeed is laughing after the last “LOL!”.  Every sms is a small story in itself. Every conversation, a small part of the larger story.

              Way back in the third year of my engineering, I recollect watching this movie “Happy Days” with her.  Not in the same theatre, not on the same computer. In our homes. Commenting on scenes in between. Making comparisons of the characters in the movie with our friends. So much to talk about, so much to discuss, so much to debate we thought! It was like watching the movie together. Perhaps, it is not. I have never gone to a theatre with anybody.  Bitching about the guy sitting next to us in classroom under his nose. No, we did not have to bitch about him. Did not mean it.  We needed something to talk. And then her mock anger. Her refusal to talk sweetly, but not stopping to reply. One of the first heuristics to differentiate real anger from the mock ones.

              Texting might not allow you to share photos. Or to type longer paragraphs. We did not have to use pixels to prove a lie. But wove beautiful lies around smaller lies. To entertain and be entertained. An extended conversation with different people across different hours of the day. The phone might have turned silent today. The memories refuse to.