Alone In Atlanta (AIA) - Love...Technically

(By Brittany Manson) - High end fashion, chart topping music, fast paced nightlife. When it comes to staying on top of the latest, Atlanta is not to be outdone. This also includes only the most advanced in technology. With new technology advancements also comes the advancement of how we approach relationships. Or is this new advancement nothing more than a detrimental setback in disguise?
Many of you are wondering how can something as helpful as technology possibly contribute to the detriment of one’s relationship? Technological advances such as the video/camera phone and social sites such as Twitter, Myspace, and Facebook have given tech savvy individuals not only new gadgets and gizmos to play with, but new portals of discovering intimate information on their latest love interest.

Recently, I’ve been trying my hand at all the new social sites and tech toys. As of right now, I have not succumb to the urge to wear my feelings on my Twitter, Facebook, or Myspace page, allowing my emotions to flow through my keystrokes, which I’ve seen happen to even the most intelligent of individuals (we can’t forget the school teacher/facebook love letter fiasco that happened only days ago).

What I have been guilty of however is the infamous TEXTversation. TEXTversation: Having full on dialogue with a person via text message instead of verbally, making what would have been a simple ten minute conversation into an hour long TEXTversation. When in the mist of a disagreement, instead of “talking it out”, I have a bad habit of “texting it out”, having LONG TEXTversations, and without the proper punctuation, can leave much room for misinterpretation. And I would be remiss if I didn’t mention text gaps. A five minute gap in TEXTversation time is like an eternity when you’ve posed a question and your partner is taking their sweet time to answer, which also leaves room for misinterpretation.

So when all is said and done and I as well as the other person have texted what is probably the equivalent of a term paper, I breathe a sigh of relief for choosing to get the unlimited texting plan and then realize that we’ve resolved nothing…

When you give someone access to one of these pieces of technology and/or sites, you are allowing them into your life through statuses, pokes, tagged photos, comments, top friends, and the like, creating a mini reality show of yourself for not only their but for everyone else’s viewing pleasure. Written words now take the place of spoken words, making conversations an endangered species. Innocent pictures taken by camera phones and tagged to friends now becomes evidence in a line of questioning from a suspicious significant other who’s not able to identify the handsome gentlemen or beautiful woman you’re hugged up with in your most recent photo op, causing yet another relationship roadblock.

So how do we fix the glitch that technology has placed in our love lives? Should we not allow our love interest access into these realms of reality until an adequate level of trust has been established? Or should we eliminate the technicalities altogether and take it back to where the most advanced item of technology we had was a telephone (rotary, not touchtone)? Technology is a part of our everyday lives, and I assume will be apart of our lives for some days to come. How you allow it to affect the different aspects of your life and your perceptions of your mates is entirely up to you. As for me, I’m going to do my best to try and remember that when dealing with love, let it come naturally…not technically.

Brittany Manson
Alone in Atlanta

Follow me on twitter: www.twitter.com/aloneinatlanta

Previous Articles:

Those Three Little Words
Men Before Kin
Clue
Keeping It In The Family
Alone In Atlanta: The Introduction

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