I had to switch cell phones twice last year. First I upgraded, and then I had some problems, so I took it back a couple of months later and upgraded again.
Both times, I was incensed at the number of phone numbers that I lost in the upgrade process. If you’re like me, you quit updating your address book (I was never very good at updating my address book anyway) once cell phones came into the picture. The idea that the SIM card only holds 200 numbers was not something I was prepared for, and both upgrades seriously drained my list of contacts.
There is, of course, another way of cleaning up your cell phone. In the old days, we crossed out old contacts in our address books. “Old contacts” might refer to a friend that moved, or it might mean something else, like “I’ll never speak to that blanking blankety blank again!”
So when it came to managing my mobile phone’s memory, I was all too glad to click on that very satisfying delete button when it came to wiping ex-boyfriends’ phone numbers. However. This quickly presented a problem.
I’m self employed. So when the phone rings, I answer it. If it’s a phone number I don’t recognize, chances are it’s related to a gig. But when I deleted The Jerk’s phone numbers from my mobile, I hadn’t realized I was effectively deleting my Caller ID, too. So when he called- as he occasionally does- I was caught out.
The call went well. We caught up for the first time in years and, having a lot of friends in common, we had lots to talk about. Unfortunately and inevitably though, the call ended with an invitation to lunch.
“I’ll think about it,” I said cautiously. “It’s never worked out for us before so I am not sure there is much point.” (This sounds harsher than it really was. Friends, etc. know that I am very honest and open and would expect no less from me.) “But I will think about it and maybe I’ll give you a call.”
I meant what I said, that things had never gone well for us in the past, and that I would consider having lunch. And that maybe I would give him a call. No hidden agendas, no stringing him along, just that I would think about it. I thought that was a fair response. He seemed to think so too, and we ended the call on good terms.
However. Here is what happened next:
- I saved his number, With His Name, so that I could effectively Caller ID him on my cell phone when or if he ever called me again. This was fortuitous because:
- After about a week, he called to remind me of the lunch invitation. Then the next day he called again. And again. And again. He called more than 20 times in just under a week, leaving me a half dozen voicemails.
- I didn’t intend to ignore him. I missed the first call because I was driving with the radio at top volume. When I heard the voicemail I thought, well, maybe. But then I had a big project due and I was madly working on my deadline. And then I got that nasty cold that’s been sweeping the tri-state.
And after a few days, he was kind of freaking me out. That much intensity from someone whom I’m not involved with, and haven’t seen for several years, was just not welcome.
The strange thing is that's really not like him. Yes, he has a lot of intensity, but I don’t remember him ever acting like this before. Actually, it’s more like something I would do.
In the past, if I thought that I had offended someone, or that they were somehow upset with me, I would call them repeatedly to try to get a handle on the situation. What I’ve learned, over time, is that no, these people were not upset with me. In fact, they hardly noticed and didn’t even remember my imagined transgression. They definitely were not put off by me, though they did seem puzzled by my worry and concern.
So I can relate. But I also feel like I didn’t promise anything, and we left the ball in my court, so to speak. I don’t feel obligated to return the call. But there is a part of me that remembers the old anxieties and how badly I handled a couple of potential (now lifeless) relationships.
With the minimum amount of soul-searching that I can muster (you’re reading it all here), I know that I’ve learned an important lesson. When I buy my Blackberry next month, I’m recording every name and number on my phone and moving it to my newest method of communication.
If I need to feel the satisfaction of deleting anyone, I’ll instead borrow a friend’s idea. Constantly squabbling with boyfriends, she changes their name to *$#%! when they’ve had a particularly nasty throw-down. That makes it really easy to decide whether or not to take the call.
