GHOSTED: IT’S A GOOD THING.

Ghosting – the practice of suddenly ending all contact with a person without explanation, especially in a romantic relationship.

Before phones and when we used to have to write letters to our lovers, ghosting wasn’t so obvious. If you didn’t get a reply from your last five letters, it may be because they all got lost in the post, or the man died of the plague or moved away to another estate. That’s what the woman would have told her friends anyway, even if she was internally questioning whether it was too early to have told the Earl of Brighton that she gets cold sores.

Today, with texts, it’s slightly more brutal. You can see it’s been delivered to your love interest, but they choose not to reply.

I tried to ghost a man once. I was 23, he was 33. I don’t remember too much about him, except he was an orthopaedist, his sister lived in the flat above him, and I liked his surname.

On our date, we went to Notting Hill and had cocktails and an Honest Burger. It went well-ish.

I turned up a little worse for wear on the second date. I had met with a friend beforehand, and we had sunk a bottle of rosé together in the Clapham North. Then I stumbled to a bar called Number 32, where I met my date and drank more rosé. After a long and good conversation, he walked me home, and we kissed on the doorstep, I said goodnight, and left him outside.

I realised the next morning that if I could turn up to a date intoxicated, then I was probably not that into the man. He didn’t seem to mind though, because later that day he texted me with a grand plan for us to go visit the Saatchi gallery.

I felt too awkward to say no, but I didn’t want to say yes. So, I left him on red, in the hope that he would get the picture.

.

He didn’t get the picture.

A week later I received a text. He told me I was being unfair, and that he didn’t deserve this.

Looking back, I do wonder what he expected from a 23-year-old girl who turned up on a date tanked up on rosé, but at the time, I felt awful. He was right. He didn’t deserve to be ghosted. I texted him back saying that I wasn’t feeling it anymore. And he replied, very politely, that it was all ok.

After that, I learnt my lesson to never ghost someone again.

Recently it was my turn to be ghosted.

I’m going to call my ghoster – Jonah.

Jonah and I were texting back and forth as frequently as a Chinese Ping Pong match – and then one day I sent a message. A day went by…. another day went by….my text, (which I thought was quite funny), was left stranded with two blue ticks at the bottom of the page.

After a week, I resigned to the fact the message will never be answered.

I came up with two reasons as to why this could be:

Jonah had died.
Jonah was ghosting me.

After googling local deaths and not finding his name, I made the executive decision that I had been ghosted. But why? It was a funny text. We were getting on swimmingly. What could be the reason?

I would never do what the Orthopaedic did and throw my toys out of the cot, screaming “HEY THAT’S NOT FAIR!”

After all, what good would that do?

At best I would receive a confirmation text to say he didn’t want to be my friend anymore and outline the reasons why. Those reasons would be boring or personal, and they will hurt a little. As they say, curiosity killed the pussycat.

I realised that it was much better to leave the gap of knowledge open for interpretation, and for that interpretation to become factual stories to tell all friends.

And so, whenever I get asked, “what happened to that Jonah guy?” I don’t have to say, he didn’t think we had chemistry. Instead, I am free to say the following:

Turns out Jonah wasn’t a dull accountant, but a spy. He has been whisked away on a secret dangerous mission to the North Pole. And if he dares text me back, he’ll put his cover in jeopardy, and me in danger of the bad guys.

Or

Jonah is married with 5 kids, and the wife found our texts. She threatened that if he dared send one more message to that slaggy-short-legged blonde, she would set fire to his Warhammer.

Or

The last I heard, Jonah was going whale watching.