My friend Sevil and I met up recently, where we sat and talked for three hours. Neither of us are strangers to hanging out in bars, but this time the meeting felt luxurious; it was face-to-face social interaction! On my walk home, I sent her a voice note, she sent me one back, and we continued to do so the next day.
I remember when my mum would ask teenage me, “what do you still have to talk about?” after I’d return from school and make a beeline for the phone to call my bestie who I’d seen 20 minutes prior. Laying on my parents’ bed next to our landline, I’d twirl the cord as my friend and I would chat, before my brothers barged in and told me to get off so they could use the internet.
If that last sentence didn’t give it away, I’m a millennial. Therefore, I don’t fear talking on the phone like younger generations typically do, but there has been a cultural shift away from calling someone. I realised this a decade ago after occasionally calling a friend and they’d pick up with a “what’s wrong?”.
It became clear that to call someone was an intrusion; only a necessity in case you were in dire need of help rather than for a chat.
The logistics of friendship can get particularly tricky when you’re a new parent. Everyone’s on different nap schedules, back at work at different times or juggling childcare, swimming lessons, parties, story time and those precious moments where you just stare catatonically at the wall. A phone call feels impossible, but a quick voice note? That we can manage.
In those hazy days of early parenting, voice notes kept me afloat as I navigated the transition into motherhood. My friend, Bella, has the gentle dulcet tones that can soothe even the grumpiest of babies – sometimes I’d play her voice notes to my grizzling daughter so she would drift off.
I’d send Bella a panicked voice note asking about TOG ratings and top-up feeds and cabbage leaves and, after she got her own kids to sleep, Bella would send me a voice note in response. She’d answer each of my questions meticulously and uninterrupted. Hearing her calm voice, it felt comforting in a way a text could never muster.
Sevil and I met at an early parenting centre when Melbourne was cautiously emerging from two years of frequent lockdowns. We exchanged a few words under our masks as we carefully circumvented the assigned dining tables, positioned three metres apart. After exchanging numbers with our small group of socially distanced and exhausted new mums, Sevil and I kept in touch via voice notes.
Not all my friends are fans of voice notes. “I hate hearing my voice,” texted one friend when I asked if we could send voice notes instead of texts. Given she wouldn’t have to listen back to hers, did she mean that she hated listening to my own? When I meet another fan of this mode of communication, our friendship blossoms.
“Is this PBS or Triple R?” my partner asked, glancing at me through the rearview mirror during a drive. Neither: it was my friend Emily. Her warm Yorkshire lilt was heard over the rhythmic sound of her breast pump and, having played it on speaker, my partner thought it was an electro-dance track.
It’s hard to curate a voice note. A breast pump whooshing. A child wailing in the background because their younger sibling shat in the bath. The guttural sounds of my cats about to pounce on each other. An inquisitive little voice asking, “who are you talking to, mummy?”. The flicker of an indicator when a car turns. The sound of taps and clunks of crockery while doing the dishes. The soft whirr of the blinds as you pull them down for the night. It’s all captured.
There’s also the catch in your voice as you share bad news, or the slow drag of exhaustion, the excitement of a new announcement, and the confidence in your tone when you describe finding your rhythm as a parent. The voice note captures it all.
Samantha Allemann is a freelance writer based in Melbourne/Naarm
