I immediately took my title as perverted, but I'm keeping it anyway.

My old iPod, Bubbah (yes, I'm one of those crazy people that names their possessions), died dramatically of old age a couple of weeks ago. With many scratches on his bodice and the pixels on his screen losing their luster, Bubbah passed at the age of four. (One year in iPod years is the equivalent to twenty human years. I'm going to make this a legitimate thing.)

However, this gave me the opportunity to buy a new iPod. His name is Louis.

Since Louis is not an iPhone, the non-removable "Contacts" section on the home screen looked very empty and lonely. I took it upon myself to back up all of my phone contacts. I was going to have such a detailed collection of friends' birthdays, phone numbers, and addresses, it would make the 2010 Census feel jealous. I also thought, 'I'm the most awkwardly antisocial person on Earth. This shouldn't take long at all.'

It took over two hours. It turns out I actually have a pretty decent sized collection of contacts. I'll leave "decent sized" to your interpretation to more than likely make myself seem more popular than I actually am.
I'm no social butterfly, but I wouldn't say my social life is lacking either. I have friends that like me and stuff. Why all the contacts, though? Why haven't I been compelled to talk to some of these people?

I made a graph to try to broaden my understanding.



It didn't work.

You're probably thinking, 'Oh, Whitney! Why don't you give someone in that 75% of your graph a call? They probably subconsciously want to hear from you! Spread smiles to every heart in the world, blah blah blah.' Well, Hypothetical Person, I think you underestimate my social anxiety. In my very limited experience I've gotten two types of responses from the 75% in my graph.

First, the indifferent. You'll send a text to them along the lines of, "Hey, I haven't talked to you in ages! How's your life? How's your job? How's your weather? How's your dog?" You put your phone down and move on with your life and realize -- maybe in a day, maybe in a week -- they never texted you back. Even if it takes a while, I eventually respond to every initial "Hey, it's been a while" text I receive (granted they're from people I like.) I'm just awesome. I never really got that whole "I'm going to give you my number and I'm never going to talk to you even if you try to talk to me" thing. Maybe it was actually their evil twin with a twisted sense of humor that agreed to "keep in touch" with me? That's my current theory.

Then there is the other type of person, who decides I'm their long lost best friend. It's like a trickle turning into a flood. They'll give me hourly updates on every irrelevant facet of their lives. It's like Twitter without the Twitter. In a frustrated huff you think, 'I just wanted to check and see if you were alive and still work at that one job you had. It's nice to know that your cat, Sprinkles, is going in for a neutering I guess.'

As much as my inner socialite likes to come out and try to embrace 100% of my contact book, I'm ultimately fine with my 15%. They're my friends that like me and stuff.

'Why not just delete the rest of them?' I ask myself in a schizophrenic-like fashion at nearly 1:00 in the morning. I seem to tend to save deletion for either "I hate your face and never want to talk to it again" or "Seriously, it's been five years." Whichever comes first. I think it's safe to say that everyone has that bulk of acquaintances they haven't quite trimmed off yet, those numbers they're afraid to delete for one reason or another. If this person texts me their own "Hey, it's been a while" message, I'm the horrible person that didn't give our uncultivated friendship a chance. This would lead me to either sending the "Who is this?" text that doesn't intend to hurt but always does, or I play a rousing game of "Guess who this old friend is?" Neither are very fun.

Also, what if I need their number later? What if a man walks into WalMart with a bomb strapped to his chest and shouts, "I am going to blow this place sky high unless someone has Bobby from high school's phone number!" Do you expect me to have that blood on my hands, the innocent lives that just wanted to save money and live better? I don't think so.

Or maybe this is all just my way of making myself seem more popular than I actually am. This idea is sound, considering I name my electronics.