Dear is dead. Time for it to now as much as pack up two centuries of introductory conceit. Email’s telegraphic cool shot first, drawing blood. Mobile phone communication did the rest.
Welcome, then, to Hi, Hi there, Hey, Hey there, or simply a full name, naked and lonely. In many cases, greetings are dispensed with altogether. If you want kindness, discretion, introductory generosity, you are, Good Sir or Lady, on the wrong planet.
The Dear John letter, dreaded as the note in which wife or girlfriend renounced the relationship or announced the presence of another person, is gone with the wind, replaced by that ugly little verb named ghosting.
CNN Radio opens with “Hi there.” Podcast “anchors” often don’t bother with anything, allowing soundtracks to fill in the space once occupied by a greeting. The BBC thankfully holds on, still insisting on a calm “Hello” followed by the news reader’s name.
CNN Radio opens with “Hi there.” Podcast “anchors” often don’t bother with anything, allowing soundtracks to fill in the space once occupied by a greeting.
What happened to introductory intimacy?
The same thing that happened to the tie: It was supplanted by the casual, which dispenses with the rigors of grace. The same rigors that once would have demanded a Mr. or a Mrs. in polite introductions and would never have allowed buddy-speak Bill or Barack for the two Mr. Presidents. Good thing, bad thing? I’m not here to judge, though I do miss reading Dear from those I respect, admire, and care about. A “Hi” seems to me like a commercial, a word both slight and contrived. As if someone had deleted R-E-S-P-E-C-T from Aretha’s landmark song.
The casual produces other casualties — the word linkage apparent. News broadcasts increasingly take for granted that the listener knows the subject matter, setting context aside, or tank up audiences with high-octane emotionalism in such a way as to ensure they know the spin instantly, since news of the twenty-first century is much, if not all, about spin. And spin is abrasive by nature.
This is a world in which Dear cannot live. Its gentleness has nothing in common with the texting universe, heavy in acronyms and emojis. Perhaps the new Dear is a red heart, but who’s around to spell it out? And might they spell it Deer? Ask the headlights.
The concept of “Dear” was simple. Educated communication between souls required a gracious greeting, even if the subsequent message, scripted or typed, bore bad news. As in, “Dear Mr. Winner: We have examined your clippings and do not believe we can offer you a job at our newspaper. Feel free to knock at our door again when you have more experience.”
Painful, yes, but polite. And I have come to believe polite pain makes for a better universe. Too bad for me. Add frowning face.
The presence of Dear also suggested the writer knew a reader existed, and that in turn led to the closing word, usually Sincerely. It, too, is gone. Again, hearts and faces rule, having mostly supplanted X’s and O’s. For a decade I thought these two letters were simply typos, brought up as I was in Regards, Best regards, Kind wishes, and even, God forbid, Love.
Be advised I understand that Dear would slow down a text message. Any greeting does. But assassinating the word wholesale doesn’t sit well with me either. I mourn it. I grieve. I seek solace in recalling times past. I crave the kindness buffer now discarded.
Dear mattered, and its burial impoverishes the writing, talking species. Again, that may ultimately be a good thing, and scientists may one day prove red hearts and smiling faces are a ton more efficient than words.
But the task of a nostalgist is to look back, not ahead, so I’m just doing my job.
Dear was a central part of my formation and life. Its death merely confirms a page has been turned from one era into another, and the aged or ancient dislike admitting their once-upon-a-time is gone. Consider those who insist their generation was smarter, more informed, more polite, more stalwart than the one they’re now condemned to live around. No generation truly escapes this weary ruefulness. All old times seem dandy when your life is on the chopping block.
All this said and admitted, nothing changes. Dear mattered, and its burial impoverishes the writing, talking species. Again, that may ultimately be a good thing, and scientists may one day prove red hearts and smiling faces are a ton more efficient than words.
But I won’t be around to read that report. Or to condone it. It’s nice at times to feel like a dinosaur. Even if dinosaurs have long been Dearly departed, another way, with its seven Frowning Faces in a neat row, of saying extinct.
