The Mass Holiday Text Message

Merry Christmas! I hope that you had a lovely day.

I am a big fan of "keeping in touch", so I love hearing from friends and family who I may not see or hear from on a regular basis. That said, holidays were once a great opportunity to make such connections. I remember a time (before everyone and their 8 year old kid had a cell phone) when people actually sent cards, made phone calls, and visited one another to spread holiday cheer.

Over the past three to four years, this trend has shifted towards embracing the "Mass Holiday Text Message". Hmmm... On one hand, it is nice to send and receive holiday cheer, and texting makes it practical to reach out to all of the people you care about (It's just not possible to visit or call everyone). On the other hand, text messages cost money, and it's not really fun to get the same message 500 times. I am more than willing to spend ten cents to receive a text message that was sent to me, personally, but it is a little bit annoying to buy hundreds of one liners that went out to every number in one's phone.

In the hierarchy of friendship, I'd say that the people you spend time with rank highest, then those who you call, then those who get a personalized text, then the generic text. People who mail cards get cool points for being extra classy grown-ups...I'm not there yet, but I hope that 2009 is my year!

The added confusion of sending/receiving the mass text is for people who change their numbers, or lose/break/upgrade phones often. If you choose to send a non-personalized mass text, please make sure that you sign your name to the end of your message to identify yourself (in case the recipient doesn't have your number saved in their phone), and to avoid awkward conversations that start with: "Hi, I just got a 'Happy Holiday's to you and yours' text from this number..."