Digital vs Old School Birthdays

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Patience is a virtue especially in the digital age. Please be patient when colleagues spend two minutes scrolling down their phones to find photos they took at a wedding or baby shower, five months ago.

Digital also becomes a problem when you get the same happy born-day message, friends and family got online. A birthday card is more personal, makes you feel special. You must be dreaming. If it’s like that, why is the greeting cards’ aisle at the drugstore always deserted? Not a soul in sight. Point taken, but that won’t stop me from longing.

What would you like for your birthday?

A greeting card in an envelope with a stamp on it.

Aaah! Aaaah! We live in the same city, in the same house!

Emojis and GIFs are immediate and funny but we cannot see them every hour, sitting on a dressing table, book shelf or a desk at the office. A birthday card is a sentence, not a comma. It says I thought about you, explored different options of making you aware that I’m glad your mother gave birth to you and finally decided to shut down the computer, drive or walk to the drugstore to buy you a card.

I lingered at the empty aisle, reading different card messages. I was there for such a long time, the security guard matched up and down twice. I finally got the perfect card, went back home and added my personal message. I walked to the post office, reluctantly. Do they still sell stamps? They were scandalized. Of course we do. We are the post office.

I’m glad everybody in the office likes the colors on your born-day card. Old school is still trending, after all.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.

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