Why I haven't returned your call. Or your email.

It's complicated. First of all, I haven't returned your call because I haven't listened to your voicemail. Because I can't bring myself to. I know you're not going to give me any trouble; you're my friend. You're not going to make any horrible demands of me. You're not going to be mean. But still, there your voicemail sits, taunting me with its little yellow envelope.

Is it fear of the unknown? I dunno. It's only developed in the last few years. It may have something to do with the fact that once I get home, I become a nesting fool, cozily hiding from the rest of the world. It's true that I was raised with a mother who said, whenever the phone rang, "Now who's calling to give me trouble?" Ooh, look! I even used that same phrase above! Hmmm, telling. My mother also hid when someone knocked at the front door and urged us all to hide as well. I still do that, but I do have a lot of front windows so I'm often flying off the couch and pressing myself flat on the floor praying they don't see me pressing myself flat on the floor in a mortifying fashion. I think my mom hid, though, because the house was not the neat house she wanted it to be owing to the four lousy rats she'd given birth to, and, for that matter, the big lousy rat who put them in her womb and was known for his inability to eat toast on a plate.

Still though, why can't I listen to my voicemail and return your call? Well, come on now, you do want something from me. Even if it's just to chat. I'm a super chatty monkey, don't get me wrong, but somehow phone chatting has lost its charm. It may well have to do with my only having a cell phone for communication and really, they're just not as pleasant to converse through as their land-based predecessors. (So get a landline, asshole. No, don't wanna.)

And again, you might be trying to make me do something.

So, I suggest to you that you email me. "But Jo," you say, "you don't respond to my fucking email, either!" (Inh. Ah. Insert odd chagrined giggle here.) Yeah, about that. The thing is. Man, when your name pops up on my in-box list, I'm giddy! I swear! I race to read your email. And if it needs a simple pithy response, I'm there, I'm your man! Ah, but should it take thought, well, aye there's the rub. Should I need to ponder over and elegantly craft my reply to you, I'll set your message aside. For three months. Until I have 203 already read email in my box all awaiting my insightful witty musings. And they HAUNT me! They whisper to me. They shout at me! Finally, I have to break down and leave my hidey-hole and go to a cafe where I have nothing to do but email you back. And then what do you do? WHAT DO YOU DO? You fire back a response in seconds! Yeah, like that's helpful. But at least you're charmed that I held onto your missive for so dang long.

Anyway. I love you. I do care about you and your life. I do want to share my life's events with you. Just not right this sec, okay? I'm watching I Love Lucy.