Technology, Sex And The Big Break Up.

One of my favourite Sex And The City episodes is when Carrie discovers she’d been dumped by her writer-boyfriend Burger on a post-it note – the morning after he apologised for being a tool, carnation in hand, and stayed over for make-up sex. Leading up to that fateful post-it morning, their relationship was under pressure. He couldn’t handle her success so he took it out on a post-it note.

And just the other day, I listened to Angela Bofill plead “break it to me gently, at least leave me with my pride.” It played on the radio.

It got me thinking. Should the way we deal the break-up card reflect the love, affection and respect we once had for our once-beloved? Or is the potentially explosive face-to-face drama all too hard and inconveniently confronting that we look to our trusty iPhones and BlackBerry Storms to deliver our fatal blow? And if we’re dating a neurotic, potential hysteria is on our hands. Faced with this possibility, cowering away behind a new iPhone doesn’t sound like a bad idea.

Perhaps, these gadgets have simply become extensions of ourselves that like blowing our noses, passing gas or sitting on the throne, dumping a girlfriend or boyfriend over the phone, sms, voicemail, email or God forbid Facebook seems a natural way subconsciously, if not biologically, to expel unwanted human concerns.

But I offer a much simpler view: the culprits, whomever they may be, didn’t care enough.

Just months ago, I dumped a guy via sms. He was an ill-mannered neanderthal who took me out on a date and made me walk on my Jimmy Choos for half an hour while we searched for a restaurant. He didn’t make a reservation. It was a Friday night. And to top it all off, I ended up paying for his dinner and mine. Then he had the nerve to invite me for a night cap! The sms was delivered promptly next morning. And although he looked of Lothario, his caveman manners made him fit for the stench of a mobile dump.

I’ve also been on the receiving end of this modern gadget’s wrath. Twice. It pains me to write this because on both occasions I respected and felt some affection for these men. The courtship that preceded each unfortunate event seemed to suggest I was more than a passing interest. And while I was by no means in love or emotionally attached, I would have preferred the long goodbye. The kind that leaves one unsurprisingly sad and disappointed yet walking away with one’s pride intact and dignity unscathed.

One sent me an email. We were together for years.

The other phoned. He lived only 200 metres away.

Funny thing was, I also wanted out. But that is beside the point.

And no matter how I rationalise the situation, I can’t help but ask: Did I not deserve the long goodbye? Did I not spend countless hours listening intently to monologues on string theory and metaphysics or the extent of Aristotle’s influence on Alexander the Great’s rhetoric on war and conquest till my ears burnt? Did I not downplay his braggadocio and self-aggrandisement for confidence and self-assuredness? Not to mention the hefty international call charges I accumulated when he travelled.

My pride is bruised and I’m five hundred dollars short of a new pair of Jimmy Choos. I’m not sure which is worse. As for the science and history lessons, Darwin’s Rottweiler in Richard Dawkins would argue that women, in their search for Mr. Right, are leading the next phase of human evolution: the extinction of the caveman gene socially evident in my Lothario. Just as George Orwell were he alive today would deem mobile dumping, in the absence of mitigating circumstances, an act of deep social injustice.

And as I pick myself up and dust myself off from the depths of this stinking mobile dump, I take comfort in knowing my little black book is still intact.

I am a girl. And I am also a modern woman.

Now, don’t bother me. I’m on a call about a date.