Reluctantly Learning ‘IM’ Speak

Several years ago we got our first computer, and although I love
surfing the Internet, shopping on line, exchanging e-mail, there is
something I have come to miss: English.
 
Several years ago we got our first computer, and although I love surfing the Internet, shopping on line, exchanging e-mail, there is something I have come to miss: English.  

This is because on top of the usual teenage slang, there is now a completely different language to keep track of called Instant Messenger Speak, or as we’ve come to know it better, “IM” for short. For those of you lucky enough not to know what that is, let me explain. IM is a form of Web slang where the English language is stripped of all of the silly, unnecessary things like, say, vowels, punctuation, and capital letters. Reading it is sort of like trying to read a sentence made up of vanity license plates. For example, this famous passage from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet: “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose. By any other name would smell as sweet.” Translated into IM Speak would read “WUT IN A NM3?!??! LOL THAT WHICH WE CAL A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NME WUD SMEL AS SWET11111!”  

Call me old fashioned, but I can’t help thinking that something very important is lost here. Way back in high school Spanish class, I was the sort of person who memorized pages and pages of dialogues and conjugated hundreds of verbs, but when it came time to partner up and have a real conversation, all that I could say was, “Hola. ¿Soy un camello, usted querría alguna sopa?” This can be translated as, “Hello. I am a camel. Would you like some soup?”

Frankly, this whole new language thing wouldn’t be quite so bad if it stayed on the Internet where it belongs, but it’s slowly incorporating itself into mainstream society. Like, for instance, the text message my teenage daughter sent: IMA RIED MAH BIEK HOMA!

This could either say, “I’m a red may bike homie!” or “I married my beak home!” Instead, she was telling me she was riding her bicycle home.

Naturally, when I mention anything to my kids as ridiculous as CALLING, I’m met with an eye roll usually reserved for people who watch Love Boat reruns.

In my defense, it’s not just me with this language problem. The other day my friend Sue found a phone message her teenage daughter took before she left for school. It said, “MAH CL3D.” And so Sue spent most of the day trying to figure out who she knew with the initials MC or whose first name was May or Mary or Marty, and last name whose might be Clad or Carlid or Callililly, and just as she was about to have a nervous breakdown, her daughter came home and said, “Oh, by the way, Grandma called.”

But if you ask me, the most frustrating thing is when people don’t stick to either IM or English and instead use a blend of what I call “IMlish.” Such as the instant message I got from my friend Judy that read: SHOE SALE!! HALF OFF! WTF 2DAY AT DA MAL! WTF SE U THEYRE!!!

Since everything in my world eventually leads back to new shoes, you can understand why it’s important to keep on top of this sort of thing. Which is why I forced myself to sit down and learn IM Speak. And, I must say, I’m getting pretty good at it. In fact my son sent me a text message today that said, “MOM CAN I STA AFTR SKOOL?

I mustered all my newfound knowledge and typed back: “OK”

Oh, all right, it wasn’t groundbreaking. But, hey, it’s a start.

LOL.