SMILEY FACE!

I’m one of the crowd whose use of emojis is limited to smiley faces and assorted other emotional display symbols. I think I’ve used a few ship symbols on occasion. I don’t disparage emojis, it’s just that whenever a system update pops up and makes a big deal of “ten new emojis!!!!” I don’t rush to explore them. I’m not an emoji of the day sort of guy. They are not a hot item for me.

On my last keyboard the funtion key was located at the very end of number row – just past the backspace key. If my finger stretched just a tiny bit too far I hit it and up popped the emojis. This happened so often that it was annoying, and annoyance developed into dislike and avoidance. On the new keyboard I have to deliberately punch it to get the odd smiley face I might use. Just they way I like it.

I have a work acquaintance to whom my attitude shows that my arteries are hardening, I have low neural plasticity, and am generally heading for the scrap pile. She is adamant that we are watching an entirely new language develop. A new form of hieroglyphs. Her excitement was almost infectious. But I felt obliged to point out that emojis were still lacking clearly defined meanings in many cases – a common dictionary that everyone could depend upon. She used a series of emojis in her reply email response that seemed to translate as me skedaddling to the nursing home for “memory support care”. I selected a random assortment of emojis that I thought might be vaguely threatening and insulting to reply. I have not heard from her since.

I know that my work peer is not an isolated individual. There are many people to whom emojis are just another part of writing. But the extreme example was last week when I overheard a conversation at a coffee shop in which someone was searching for the emoji that encapsulated a specific meaning. He grabbed his phone, pulled up the emojis, and started searching. At some point, he found what he was looking for and pointed it out to the rest of the table.

My attention to this interchange did not go unobserved. Glaring at me, he rapidly scrolled through emojis until he found one that satisfied, glared at me, and showed it to his friends with a certain amount of glee. There was laughter all around. I became deeply involved in something on my phone.

So, where does this whole emoji thing go? Does it continue to evolve into a greater adjunct to communication? Perhaps it will be surpassed in a few years’ time by something else, and eventually only be used by sects of emoji enthusiasts residing in remote districts of the lunar colonies? I can see it now, monumental emoticon hieroglyphics laser-engraved on the cliffs of the Muskotropolis.

I definitely need another cup of coffee and a snack!☕️🍩🍰 That is just too weird!👽