I’ve been thinking so much about connections, communication, etc. after reading about our loneliness epidemic in this country. It’s also in the UK, Canada to name just two. It was on the news too. This was going on before Covid lockdowns and isolation and that made it even worse of course. We humans are a lonely lot, in spite of being social creatures by nature. The Surgeon General says our culture needs to change. That’s a tall order. I think American culture is superficial to begin with anyway.

I don’t think the people who are ghosting people are the same ones feeling lonely. That would be self sabotage.

Even the verbiage used implies relationships that aren’t really there. We have “connections” on LinkedIn and “friends” on Facebook. Yet I didn’t connect with any contact on LinkedIn, business reasons or not. They didn’t respond to my messages and I eventually deleted my account. I was never on Facebook. We say “followers” too like people hang on your every move or word.

On the subject of calls, one time someone gave my number out without asking. It was for business reasons but I still didn’t like it. I think it was from interviewing at a company and the interviewer gave my number to a recruiter. I told her I would have liked to have been asked. She said she didn’t think I’d mind. She thought wrong. And that was in the 80’s when it was easier to keep your number private.

And so as far as our numbers and other personal data, it feels like a losing battle keeping one’s information private in this digital age. And harder to get a human when calling a company especially a large one. They want you to go online for everything eliminating human contact. I think it’s about money.

I do think people can give out numbers out of politeness like the lady at the library I was acquainted with. I’m too lazy to see if I posted here or in another thread, but I gave her my number. I didn’t ask for hers but she gave it to me. She also claimed her phone was out of order. She never did call me nor did I call her. My bs radar picked up bs and I doubt her phone is still out of order after one year.



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Posted directly on site using iPhone