Truth time.  I love my text app.  LOVE it.  Texting may be the single greatest thing to happen in my lifetime – okay, maybe next to the smart phone.  And e-mail.  I sure do love my e-mail.  But for the purposes of this post, let’s just say texting rocks.  It’s our generation’s sliced bread.

This particular adoration may have something to do with my aversion to phone calls.  I was never the girl who spent hours talking with her friends, but somewhere between fifteen and twenty-five years old I developed an active distaste for the phone.  It became stressful, even draining, for me.  Too much pressure, too many unknowns, too little time to figure out what to say when things go wonky.

Yeah, I know that sounds completely nutty, but if we’re not hanging out face to face then I just do better in writing.

Which rolls me back to texts.  Granted, they’re not ideal in every situation.  A decent breakup, for example – that really does demand an in person conversation.  (Knock, knock – teens? are you listening?)  But there are plenty of situations where texts are exactly what the doctor ordered.

**  Friday night plans.  For two people or twelve, get a group text going and Plans Are In Motion.  Because coordinating a get together by phone or e-mail between large numbers of people is ridiculously difficult, but the pile on in text world is all about efficiency.

**  “On the way.”  Useful in car pools and bank robbery getaways, it’s the perfect heads up so you don’t find yourself idling in someone’s driveway.  For half an hour.  While they try to find their shoes.

**  Substitute shopping assistance.  I’ve been married for, like, a thousand years or something and yet I still can’t remember what deodorant my husband uses.  Contact solution, soap, cereals, peas – all these I’ve got down cold, but deodorant?  Arguably one of the most important personal hygiene products?  Nope.  I blame it on the fact that there are fifty variations within every brand sold.  Solution?  Snap a pic, text it, and ask, “Is this right?”  ‘Cause nobody’s got time to return deodorant.

**  Big News Blasts.  Listen, I’m not talking “we’re having a baby” here.  Some big news needs more finesse than a text.  But if you want to let the entire family know your sixth grade baby made the school basketball team (HOLLA, BEAR!!!) then there’s nothing better than a group text.  Quick, efficient, and no one gets bumfuzzled because they found out last.

**  Kid updates.  Listen, as much as I bitch about my kids and technology, I have to admit texting is a pretty sweet system.  Items we’ve addressed via text over the last few months alone: time to come home, reminders to feed the dogs, requests to stay after for school events, if I’m running late to pickup, and a ton more I can’t even think of at the moment.  Let’s just say when the kids get their phones taken away it hits all of us on the communication front.