Forgive the Lateness of My Reply

I'm going to go all Andy Rooney on you for a minute here. By the way, did you know that he's a decorated war hero? I had no idea. It doesn't make him any less annoying, but the man's got medals.

Anyway, I remember when no one had email. Well, maybe not no one, but certainly no one I knew, and a lot more people besides. We used primitive drums to send messages from village to village until semaphore was invented.

No, actually, we used telephones. The kind that plug into a wall, mostly. And now that so many people have so many different telephones, everyone seems to be afraid to use them. Instead, they send email.

Now I'll be the first to admit that email is handy. It costs less than sending a letter (unless you really examine the costs of email, in which case it might very well not, but that's not the topic for discussion), it's easy, and it's quick. But I always try to write my emails as if I were writing a letter, because that's the way I look at them: easier letters. I'll admit that I do bend letter-writing rules, but I don't use chat-speak or emoticons or any of the numerous other annoying things that people do, and I always check my letters before I send them to make sure they aren't egregiously misspelled or un-grammared (as far as my grammar and the use of imaginary words goes, anyway).

I could write a book of complaints about people's awful email style, but that's not what I'm complaining about today. Today, it's the fact that email is not instantaneous communication, and you can't be sure if the person on the other end will get it by a certain time. I find, more and more, that people expect me to check my email every few hours or so to make sure that something important hasn't come up and rescheduled a meeting or changed a date. I get cancellation notes by email all the time, and usually the person sent that email an hour before the meeting that was cancelled, so I have to get into the habit of checking my email before I go out the door.

People, email is not a telephone substitute. I know that it's hard to call people; I hate the telephone too. But if you need to change something a few minutes before everyone is going to show up, you need to call them and tell them, rather than relying on them to check their email (to say nothing of relying on the various email systems to accurately deliver your note). Email is like easier letters, not less-personal phone calls.

Unfortunately, since I staunchly refuse to get a cell phone, most of the time people can't reach me by phone either. I think maybe people should think more than fifteen minutes ahead, and if it's an emergency, at least try calling. And don't expect me to answer an email within ten minutes of you sending it either. It's a two-way street, and I walk slowly. Plus all that editing and checking takes time, but I think it's worth it not to get an email which looks like a three year old typed it.

I am obviously alone in all of these views.