Phone Phobia

I have a phone phobia. I'm sure there's some scientific name for it but I don't know what it is. All I know is that I have never enjoyed talking on the phone the way many girls do, not even when I was a teenager. I can talk to just about anyone face to face but I cannot deal with talking to them on the phone.

I mean, I do use the phone when I have to. I'm not that bad, but I only use it as a last resort. I will email, IM, text or go see someone in person first and only call them when I have no choice in the matter. I will wait for days to return someone's phone call while I figure out if I can get around calling them at all. When I have to call someone I am not extremely good friends with I may sit down and write notes about what I'm going to say. (Like Monk does for in person conversations, if you ever saw that show.)

I just have absolutely no social phone skills. I am a shy phone person but usually very outgoing in person, go figure. I don't know how to fill pauses so they just go on and on and I have no idea how to end a conversation so I always just wait for the other person to do it. I'm always worried that whatever I say to end it will sound rude. Go figure, since whatever other people say would probably be the same thing but always comes out sounding fine from them.

And I always worry that since all the person on the other end has to go on to form impressions of me is my words that I'm going to say the wrong thing or say something the wrong way and they won't be able to see my face and since I can't see theirs, I won't know how they took what I said. And I'm a very sarcastic person and sarcasm doesn't play well over the phone sometimes so I might offend someone. I just need to see the person to bounce the conversation back and forth better.

So that's my dirty, freaky little secret for tonight.