What's the point of having a mobile phone?

Our society consists of all kinds of people whose mindsets we can't even begin to fathom - unless one day there comes a technology where pure thoughts can be shared between brains! There are introverts, eccentrics, autistics, etc., with whom keeping in touch with can cause you so much stress, distress, and even trauma because they don't behave or perceive you or society in the "normal" way you expect.

I learnt this the hard way day before yesterday when I got in touch with a longtime friend after several years, had a drink at a restaurant in Male', and exchanged numbers. I forgot to ask the specifics about his phone usage and assumed - to my great mistake as I later learnt - that he used his smartphone just like any other "ordinary" person. I think he is also equally responsible for the later fallout resulting from him not having told me those specifics. He should not obviously assume that I can read his mind!

What I didn't know was his attitude to the cell phone revolution, and more straight to the point was, what are his motives for having a smartphone, in addition to getting information and been entertained from it, not to mention its (primary?) function as a device for communicating with others.

What happened was he lent me a book at our meeting, and a few days later after finishing reading it, I sent him a message through WhatsApp day before yesterday, asking him how to go about returning the book.

After several hours he hadn't responded and even the "seen" tick hadn't appeared. I wondered whether he was sleeping although it was daytime but didn't want to call in order not to wake him up if indeed he was napping.

I let several hours pass again and by then I started getting worried. All sorts of negative things started entering my mind. Did he die of a natural cause and nobody had discovered his body yet? Did he overdose on a doctor's prescription? (The fate of Heath Ledger and Michael Jackson came to my mind). Or worse, was he murdered?

When my anxiety began to reach its limits, I sent him a message stating that I was getting worried about whether he was alright because I was getting no response from him. And when I reached a point where I felt I might explode, I decided to send him a strongly worded message even at the risk of pissing him off.

So I wrote that however busy he was, it would be polite and courteous to simply drop me a line just to let me know he is alright which would ease my mind.

Surprisingly, he immediately replied, saying that this was the "type of thing" which caused a "rift" between him and another person who used to be a mutual friend.

He said that it was not a question of being polite and that he hadn't even read my messages until that point. And he additionally said not to expect him to reply every day.

I can claim that he is an enlightened person but this confrontation demonstrated that he failed to understand the dynamics of social interaction even though just last week he described another mutual friend as "ignorant" about Maldives' history and culture for implying that Maldives do not have writers capable of winning international prizes.

I can understand that in this age of information overload you may need to switch off your mind and get off the grid to enjoy some quiet private time.

Yet, without any problems, I have many friends with whom I keep a continuous running conversation, on WhatsApp and Viber, via a thread discussing virtually everything under the sun. If we were free, we would chat in real time; if not, we would leave a message on the thread to respond to at a convenient time. Sometimes we might respond after a few days, which we don't mind, but we make it a point to respond as early as possible if any of us sounded urgent. These are just so many ways we can deal with communication technologies.

I responded to this friend's reply by saying that if he had told me that he kept a distance from communication technologies, I would not be bothering him in the way I did day before yesterday - to which he replied with a simple "ok". But he has still not responded to my initial query concerning how to return his book.

No wonder that there is a rift between him and that friend because I know that friend to be a person who is very professional and expects the same professional standards from others such as meeting deadlines and responding to calls and messages at the earliest convenience - qualities you need to have if you want to survive in any livelihood and life in general.

I am still quite shaken by this incident. And my being a victim of Bipolar Disorder doesn't help my mental health with regard to dealing with such people who act as, unintentionally or not, inconsiderate assholes towards their fellow human beings. 

One lesson I learnt from this incident is that it has convinced me all the more that, in order to maintain my sanity and mental well-being, I must distance myself from toxic people who give off negative vibes: I need to maintain a state of positive thinking and surround myself with people who emit positive vibes if I need to survive in human society.