You don't need me to tell you just how common the use of texting acronyms, abbreviations and symbols are these days. If you all take a look at the last message that you sent or received on your cell phones, I guarantee that there will be one of these in there. Whether it's a 'lol' in reference to something amusing, a smiley face, or simply an 'x' at the end symbolising a kiss. If I am wrong then I apologise, but I'm more than likely not!
A rather random experience the other day really hit home with me that despite the fact text language is something almost everybody with a cell phone uses, it is still more than possible for there to be some rather major misinterpretations. I will relay this is in a quick story for you.
One night last week I was at my friends house watching the game on television, he is a big Chelsea fan and they were playing my team Liverpool. The game was a very entertaining one, and despite the fact our attention was totally on the screen in front of us, it would have been almost impossible not to hear the howl that his girlfriend suddenly let out in the next room. She genuinely sounded like a wounded wild animal and both of us got up to dash into the other room to see what was wrong.
Half expecting to see that she had dropped her laptop on her foot, I was relieved to see that she was holding her cell phone in her hand and sitting at the table. She had clearly come to no harm, and through her sobbing she slowly explained that she had been sent an upsetting text message.
My friend took the phone from her hand and read it out loud, "Lou, I have only just got back from traveling in the far East and I am so sorry to hear that your Dad passing away, lol Katie".
I straight away realised what the problem was, and so did my friend. This was no laughing matter as Lou's Dad really had died a few months back, and I knew that she was still grieving for him. But she had clearly got the wrong end of the stick.
The text message, although totally innocent, could have been taken out of context quite easily by anyone, and this is what had happened.
You see whereby most people know that the texting acronym 'LOL' stands for 'Laugh Out Loud', it can also be used as an acronym, to say 'Lots Of Love'. The latter is clearly how her friend Katie had meant it.
It took us a few minutes to calm Lou down and to explain that Katie had in fact not meant anything bad in her text. We suggested that if she has been away traveling for so long she could quite easily have lost touch with her text message acronyms and that it was an innocent mistake.
I guess the moral of the story is that if you are one of the many people who likes to use texting symbols, abbreviations and acronyms in their messages, it is always worth reading over what you send first so that you don't end up upsetting somebody!
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