Maine People Rank Among the Highest Maintenance Friends in the US

We're a weird people, we Mainers.

I will freely admit that I'm pretty terrible about communication. I'm the epitome of a person who gets a text, looks at it, swears I'm going to respond right away, and then ADHD takes over and I promptly forget about all that. Next thing you know, I'm hastily sending apology texts and getting back to them a day later. Of course, not everyone is like me.

According to a recent study, there was a lot of interesting data discovered about Mainers. Sure, we can be a little odd up here, but sometimes we can actually be pretty good about certain things. For instance, we excel at returning text messages. Sure, I'm terrible at it, but I'm probably not your average Mainer, for better or worse.

There's a dark side to our speedy responses.

In all of the United States, we read and respond to our texts better than any other state. We're also #7 in the country for opening our emails and reading them. That's all great stuff, right? Well, we also have a self-imposed "tax" that comes along with that, because you always have to balance the good with the bad.

We are actually among the highest states for being "high maintenance" friends. Apparently, because we're so speedy and efficient about all these things, we've grown to expect it. Mainers leave so few unread texts and unopened emails on the table, we expect the same from everyone else. By the way, it's friends and family who get ignored most, if we decide not to respond. Go figure. Sorry, Mom.

But wait, there's more!

Because Mainers expect regular check-ins, calls, hangouts, returned texts etc., we've admitted that our friendships can be negatively impacted by people who don't respond quickly, which is probably why I have so few friends, now that I think about it. I'm not part of the majority, haha.

Maybe that's the ticket with someone in your friend group who's letting you down. If you've been trying to put your finger on why, maybe it's their lack of communication. Or maybe it's your lack, and this is why no one is talking to you, hahaha. Either way, we've all at least learned that if you text a Mainer, expect a speedy response. Unless you're texting me...

Radical subject change... (remember that whole ADHD thing?) But February vacation is almost here and if you're traveling, get familiar with this list...