Free time has become a hot commodity. With school, work, and just life in general, it’s hard to find time for anything. Even finding time for something as simple as answering a text message.
I’m a college student—I know what it’s like to have tons of homework, papers and presentations all due around the same time. I get it. But I’m not busy every second of every hour of the day. I have some free time when eating my bowl of cereal in the morning. I have some free time while waiting for my class to start. I have some free time before I go to bed at night.
During this free time, I like to catch up with some friends. I’ll shoot a quick “Hey, how are you?” text to a few of them, just so they know that I’m thinking about them.
Having friends scattered across the United States makes it impossible to know what their schedules are like. Chances are, they may be tied up with some kind of obligation and I get that. So, I give them some time. Let’s say a window of three to four hours. They have to have some free time in there somewhere, right? Apparently not.
About six or 26 hours after I’ve sent the initial text, I’ll receive a reply back from my friend saying “Sorry, I’ve been so busy,” and that’s it. Again, I get it; I’m on the same boat as you! I just want to check in, see how you are doing, how the semester is going and just let you know that even though we are miles away, I’m wondering how you are. I’m not asking for a lengthy conversation, it’s just a simple check-in. So when I receive that irritating text of “Sorry, I’ve been busy,” I roll my eyes.
You claim to be “busy” but yet, during the time that I sent you that text message, you’ve posted a story on Snapchat, tweeted three times, shared a Buzzfeed article on Facebook and posted a picture of the sunset on Instagram. If you have time to be active on social media, why don’t you have time to reply to a single text message? I’m not asking for much here. When I see that you have updated every single one of your social media platforms and have elected not to reply to my text message, I assume that I am ranked low on your priority list. It’s not a friendly feeling.
Strangely enough, when something big and/or exciting happens in my life, like getting an internship or being elected to student government, I am asked, “OMG! Why didn’t you tell me?” Oh, I don’t know…maybe it’s because you’re “too busy” to answer my text messages?
Don’t neglect your friends and family while away at school. Stay in touch with them as often as you can. Don’t choose to tweet about the dining hall being out of romaine lettuce over texting back your family and friends. “Sorry, I’ve been busy” is a lame excuse. There has to be a minute in your hectic schedule for you to reply to a text message.
Just take some time to think about this. If you have any, of course.
