💾 Archived View for adamthiede.com › log › 2023-09-17.gmi captured on 2023-11-04 at 11:20:13. Gemini links have been rewritten to link to archived content

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I'm Not Your Damn Secretary

Said my wife, to me, a billion times since we got married. But unfortunately for her, it's not me that treats her like a secretary, it's everyone else.

I am not hard to get ahold of. I tell people I have a phone number, for calling, and an email, for emailing, and if they really want to IM me, I've got XMPP. Also, I will begrudgingly respond to SMS messages, but know I will use that to transition to a phone call ASAP, because texting on a flip phone sucks. But still, everyone tries to contact me via my long-suffering not-secretary of a wife. She gets texts (it's always only texts) asking about me, and my scheudle, and if I can go do things.

She's told me it's because people are afraid of calling. I used to understand that when I was a depressed anxiety-riddled early-twenties kid who lived alone and didn't have any regular social interaction. But none of my friends are like that. They're all mostly adults, married, with kids of their own.

Three hot takes:

If my phone rings at an inappropriate volume, at an inappropriate time and place, that is my fault. Phones can do automatic silent modes since forever.
Going through my wife to get to me is sometimes effective, but incredibly disrespectful. Both to me and to her. If you want to talk to me, talk to me. I know I'm not the best at knowing what the schedule is, but I will talk to her about my schedule, because that's what we do, living in a family together. I call my buddy and he talks to his wife, or we tell our wives to talk to each other. This is an effective, time-honored tradition that keeps everyone in the loop.
Men should not be texting my wife. Full stop. Don't text people of the opposite sex that are married. There can be something private and secretive and intimate about it that calling just doesn't allow.

Just call me.

/rant

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