For the past several years, I have been noticing that many people never are without the use of their cell phones and if they aren’t making calls, they are looking at emails or texting. This is causing a huge breakdown in our ability to communicate face to face. How often do we see families out for dinner where scarcely a word is spoken during the time they are together? Each person is buried in his/her device, mostly connecting with texts which could wait.
My pet peeve in life is having lunch or dinner scheduled with someone who spends most of the time texting or on calls. How sad! What great times they’re missing and opportunities to really get to learn about others with a real conversation.
Recently a friend was having lunch with her two college-age sons. They were in the restaurant for about an hour. When it came time to pay the bill, the server presented it and said that $50.00 had been taken off the check. Very surprised, my friend asked why. The server said that a guest at a neighboring table was so impressed that neither young man looked at his phone the whole meal, he wanted to reduce her bill.
Please for the sake of truly engaging with people, put the phones away, unless you’re a medical professional and it’s life or death. Having one’s nose in a device continually when with others is rude and extremely upsetting to those who’ve come to enjoy a gathering.
