LOVE in the times of SMS

Much before WhatsApp and video chats, there was a thing called – Short Message Service. Even though the names specifies that the feature is made to carry short messages, we never thought twice writing a three-page message either.

Love in the times of SMS had patience. I remember how I used to send him ‘Hi, what’s up?’ and patiently wait for him to reply. Yes! Of course we didn’t have the feature called ‘last seen or online’. We didn’t know if the person was on his cell phone or taking a bath. We couldn’t figure out if we are being ignored on purpose or the person is genuinely busy. If the requirement of a reply was too urgent, a miscall followed by two more SMS used to be sufficient.

We used to send good morning texts in broadcast ensuring that not even one friend should sleep without a good night. Such was the era of innocence. Soon enough the sites started giving away SMS shayaris to forward gained popularity. We also started maintaining a book to save the best texts and write them manually. I remember there was a folder called ‘archive’ where I used to save his best texts. Some of the texts were even being memorized because you just cannot let them go even if you lose your phone.

Back then, we didn’t have the option of a bundle of emojis like we have today. There were few frequently used emoticons which conveyed the basic emotions of the sender. ‘  ,  , :/, :O ‘. One dreadful condition of this SMS era was that we didn’t have the phone lock system. I am talking about a personalized phone lock system. This implied that anybody could pick the phone and go to the inbox folder. Hence, some of the smart a**es used to save the number with a different name forecasting that if at all their parents questions them about one particular text they can either answer that it is their friend or say that the same friend has lost the cell phone and somebody else is operating it.

This very reason never allowed me to hide who am I dating from my close friends, after all, they should at least have an idea of weave the story if I ever get caught. But, it was fun! The telecom companies were generous in those days. We used to get 15,000 SMS per day in just 60-100 rupees and it was surely a cheap deal. Those times were simpler and free of fuss. There were no screenshots, but trust was a thing.

But, eventually TRAI came with limits and the shift to smartphones occurred. Soon smartphones took over the market and so did the popularity of WhatsApp. Gradually, SMS became a short message service again. We no longer chat using the SMS feature of the phone. Being a generation that has witnessed both the worlds I cannot pick which one was good. But, yes! love in the times of SMS surely had the innocence that no longer exist.

Also published on - Love in the times of SMS - Shweta Suvarna