Having been swamped with so many social gatherings and interactions over the week, I decided to spend time alone in Makati on a Sunday afternoon. While having a solitary dinner at Greenbelt 1, I felt I needed some conversation. So I decided to use the unlimited Globe-to-Globe text promo I availed of the day before. So I typed in this message:
“M here havng diner alone at Thai in a Box in Greenbelt.
Solitude is good, but after a wyl, u realyz havng company is beter. Hehe.”
Solitude is good, but after a wyl, u realyz havng company is beter. Hehe.”
I then sent it to a dozen of my friends, partly to find out how they would respond to my musings, and mostly to just use up my free alone time and maximize my unlimited Globe-to-Globe text. Here are their responses...
- Four of them thought I wanted company that particular time, and even said they'd join me for dinner had they been free that time. These responses really caught my attention, since I did not intend to invite them to join me. Knowing the hospitable nature of us Filipinos, however, I guess we simply can read between the lines and are gracious in offering our company to someone who seems to need it.
- Three people asked “Why are you alone?” – two of them were simply curious what drove me to spend alone-time on a weekend, while the other one found it unusual for me to have dinner alone in Greenbelt.
- Two out of twelve knew that the text was just one of the outlets of my self-expression: Olive (who, perhaps having known me for almost a quarter of a century, just knows that it was one of those days when I would text my thoughts out loud); and Pastor Bong (whose response made me laugh out loud because of its sarcasm)
- And, there was one very different response – Jun, one of my cellgroup mates in IVCF, said: “Hehe… wrong send!”
By the way, it might interest you to know that I did a quota sampling of the respondents who were chosen based on their level of intellect and profundity (read: those whom I texted are people whom I consider intelligent and profound). And of course, they have to be a Globe subscriber. Hehehe...