Correspondence
Journal
Volume 2
Social Media has all but destroyed the art of letter-writing; yet also brought with it an uncomfortable development. Why haven’t you replied yet?
I
SOCIAL MEDIA has produced a demanding phenomenon in the subject of correspondence.
Correspondence by social media is helpful, keeping people in touch, especially when communities are in ‘lockdown’.
A huge amount of social media correspondence is frivolous, and there is a very large swathe of double-thumb punching that is dangerous or downright vicious. Tempers are shortened.
You didn’t answer my text!
But I replied to you.
Yes, and I replied to you!
Yes, and I said thank you, and you didn’t come back.
That’s rude!
What is that line that comes to mind?
“You can’t answer an answer.”
Discarding the pen and taking up the iPhone minisized keyboard has led to very impressive typing speeds - not skills - with two thumbs. Great Grandparents look on in amazement.
OOh! Isn’t he clever. Look at her speed!
Later, when observing said precocious darling …
In a barely disguised whisper,
Why is he fisting his pen?
Why does she hold her pencil like I used to hold a rolling pin?
Muscle strain Gran. Muscle weakness mum. They’ve lost the ability to correctly hold the pen between thumb and forefinger. But there’s no point trying to do anything about that, because their teachers do the same. You’re from a different, and in a lot of ways, a better Age … but hey ho!
Kenneth Thomas Webb
Liverpool and Gloucestershire
June 9, 2022
All Rights Reserved
United Kingdom - Ukraine - Denmark - Germany - Australia - New Zealand - Canada - USA
© Kenneth Thomas Webb 2022
One of the Fifteen Founding Members of the Leaders Lodge
First written May 7, 2021
[i] page 120, ‘Call Me By Your Name’
[ii] the beautiful image is by Anne Nygård @polarmermaid via Unsplash
Ken Webb is a writer and proofreader. His website, kennwebb.com, showcases his work as a writer, blogger and podcaster, resting on his successive careers as a police officer, progressing to a junior lawyer in succession and trusts as a Fellow of the Institute of Legal Executives, a retired officer with the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve, and latterly, for three years, the owner and editor of two lifestyle magazines in Liverpool.
He also just handed over a successful two year chairmanship in Gloucestershire with Cheltenham Regency Probus.
Pandemic aside, he spends his time equally between his city, Liverpool, and the county of his birth, Gloucestershire.
In this fast-paced present age, proof-reading is essential. And this skill also occasionally leads to copy-editing writers’ manuscripts for submission to publishers and also student and post graduate dissertations.
