Just because you leave a message on someone’s answering machine and they don’t call you back, that is no reason to think they don’t still love you.

I am amazed at the people who anguish because someone didn’t return their call. These sensitive people sit there by their phone waiting for a return call, thinking of all the unkind reasons why the person did not call them back. Some of these people even decide they will never call that person again.

Doesn’t the general public know that people who listen to their answering machine messages sometimes have a frisky thumb?

I may have three messages in a row from my daughter or from Jacqueline, each wanting to arrange a time to walk, as if I were the walk coordinator. After the third whiny message in a row, and without even really paying attention to the fourth message, my thumb assumes the next message is also from Lauren or Jacqueline, and, without as much as a by your leave, my thumb too hastily cuts off the message before it has hardly begun.

It is then I clutch my throat and say, “Aughh,” never ever to know who called. Let’s face it, it could have been anybody. It is at these times that I fear the loss of an opportunity of a lifetime and also the loss of a sensitive friend.

There is another reason why sometimes your friend doesn’t call you back, and you just have to be open-minded. Here is an example:

Just recently I received an irate email from Allan, Host of the Bridging Heaven and Earth TV Show out of Santa Barbara, California, (www.heaventoearth.com) . In his outraged and concerned email, he asked if I ever pick up my phone messages. It turns out he had called me, leaving a long message imitating a fictitious Western cowboy named Billy Bob. How can Allan assume that I would know who it was?

Besides that, Allan, dear, of course, I do pick up my phone messages! Just because there happen to be sixteen messages waiting on my machine, that’s no reason for you to become worried or impatient.

Now, dear friends, you can understand how it is that if your friends don’t call you back, it doesn’t mean that they don’t still love you.

Now that you know the reasons why I advise that you always dial your friend’s number once or twice more, especially if you were calling me.