Texting horrors

I remember being in school and the trouble that I used to get into passing notes. When I was 16 my friend and I were dating two guys who were best friends. We made a game out of keeping track of how many times we each had sex with our respective boyfriends. Our method of recording the “scores” was to write about it in notes that we passed back and forth to each other in the halls. And one time there was another friend who wrote to me all of the gory details of how she lost her virginity in the back of some football player’s truck. As luck would have it, my mother found both of these notes. And to make matters worse, I gave note number two back to the author and her mother found the note too! I had a hell of a time trying get out of those sticky situations….

Today we are faced with a whole new danger when trying to pass on personal or confidential information to someone else. When I was growing up we didn’t have email and texting and IM. It was only good old paper and pen. My mother always taught me to never put anything on paper that I wouldn’t want to come back and bite me in the ass. Obviously I didn’t pay very close attention to her advice. And as the following examples will prove, I still don’t.

Read on for three examples of the dangers of texting, aka “Texting Horrors.” 



Texting Horror #1: My first example isn’t one that actually happened to me, but to my sister. Since it did almost directly involve me I thought it was a good example to include here. Last year I got in a car accident that totaled my car. The car sat at the auto body shop for a few days waiting for me to go and clean it out so the insurance company could take it away. Being that I leave my house at 5:30 am and don’t get home until 7:00 pm, I called my sister and asked her to go and empty out my car. In order for the rest of this story to make sense I must first explain that my car carried a lot of stuff. And amongst all of that stuff was my old “kit.” I used to be a Romance Specialist for a leading company in the home pleasure party industry. In other words, I had a trunk full of various massage oil, edible paints and dildos. My sister went to empty the car and sent me a text afterward that read: “you better kiss my ass! There was a lot of stuff in there and the guy did not seem happy. I swear if there were any dildos in the trunk I am going to kill you!” She waited a while for my response and when one didn’t come she realized her mistake…she accidentally sent the text to our old (and our younger sister’s current) high school guidance counselor! Oh boy…did I have a fun time explaining that one the next day!



Texting Horror #2: Last summer I wrote about my cousin who was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had her mastectomy and started chemo treatments in October. One morning she texted me and told me that her hair was starting to fall out in big clumps, especially in the shower. Every morning I send a text to my father, so along with the usual “Hi, I’m here,” I added the following: “Gina told me that she is starting to lose her hair. It is coming out in clumps. I feel so bad for her. :-( “ Sure enough, a few minutes later I got another text from Gina…”Hi. Don’t feel bad about my hair. It’s okay. I think you accidentally sent me the text instead of your father.” I was horrified! We had a good laugh over it, and still do, but I was so freakin’ embarrassed!



Texting Horror #3: So, my most recent texting mishap happened just last night. And this one can be taken entirely the wrong way, so please read closely and understand that **I am in no way, shape or form passing any judgments nor do I hold prejudices, I am simply telling the story as it happened.** I went to a fundraising event with my cousin Gina and my friend Tara. Gina and Tara had never met before this night, though they’ve both heard me talk about the other. As we were sitting at out table waiting for our dinners, Gina started telling me a story about a mutual friend. He had a bad experience at a local business and blamed it on the woman who took care of him. She was a large, black woman and he made a joke about it by incorporating "black" into the name if the business. Now, I know Gina and that she didn’t mean any harm by this story, but and there’s always a but, I also know that Tara has a bi-racial son. I know this really only through pictures of his father and it is nothing that we’ve ever had a conversation about, and I guess it’s just because I never felt that there was anything to talk about, other than the fact that her son is so, so cute. I’m not the type of person who judges that stuff and never really gave it a second thought before anyway. Well, I didn’t know if Tara had heard the story and more importantly if it would have upset or offended her at all, so I decided that it would be best to give Gina a heads up via a quick text message just so that she knew and didn’t accidentally say anything else that might make her feel awkward or upset Tara. I quickly typed the message and pressed send and that sat there staring at Gina’s phone, waiting….and waiting….and waiting. And that’s what it hit me! No f-ing way! I SENT THE MESSAGE TO TARA!!! Seriously? Haven’t I learned anything? Now what? So, I did the only thing I could do. I asked Tara to go outside with me for a minute because I had to tell her something. In the middle of laughing and crying I told her what I did, all the while feeling like the most horrible person in the world. And amazingly, she laughed it off and said, “Oh, I know, I was there!” Needless to say, I felt terrible all night. She kept telling me that she understood and not to worry about it. And I do believe her, but I worry that I will now always have that little part of me wondering if she was really upset or mad, or still is.



So please, please, take it from me! Texting is not only dangerous while driving. It can wreak havoc in ways that you never would have imagined. Please take heed before you send a message and double, hell triple check it, and make sure that you are sending it to the right person!