How to start a conversation

Occasionally, maybe once every six months, even less often, I get a random message on Instagram from random people. I suppose they either want to have a casual conversation, are a bot account, or try to hit on me. Whichever the reason is, I do not respond, and the reason lies in the initial message. Although, to be honest, sometimes people I know but don't follow send me messages and I ignore them, but that's another story. 

Here's why I don't consider replying.

When trying to start a conversation on Instagram people send me messages like "hi" or "hey" or some other variation of the word. And that's all. I just got one message like that and I was wondering if I should respond. I don't really want to, but I thought let's see who they are. Upon visiting the profile I can only see three posts: a short video of a doggo getting a massage, a drawing, and a picture of a water drop hanging on a branch. 

Based on these three images, I can start a conversation, ask a question or something and work from there, but isn't it a bit risky? Who is this person? Is this their dog? Did they draw the picture? Did they take that photo? Or are all of them—seeing how there is no common theme—just pictures they saw and thought it was a good (not!) idea to upload them on their profile?

Now, if there would have been something more to the message, something like "hey, what is that flower in your picture?" or "hey, where did you find those swans?" or even something like "hey, I like the colour of your hair", I might have answered. 

Let's think about a while back, before social media became such a huge part in our daily lives, how did they do it? Our ancestors. How did they meet their lovers? Did they say "hi" and that was it? No, of course not. That would only get maybe a "hello" back, and then maybe get a conversation started, but simply saying "hi" doesn't ensure you'd get to actually talk to someone. So what did they say then? I don't know really, but I'm guessing they said something like "hi, do you have the time?" or "hi, sorry, your shoelace is undone" or if they didn't see anything to start with, they'd pull a handkerchief out of their pocket and say "hi, I think you dropped this" and from all these plain, boring things to say, they'd have higher chances of starting an interesting, colourful conversation. Like so:

 — Hi, I think you dropped this. 

 — Hello. Um... No, that's not mine? 

 — Are you sure? It was right there on the ground. 

 — Yes, never seen it before.  

 — Oh, okay then. Do you think I should let it there or should I keep it?  
    [...]   

And just imagine what other direction this conversation could have gone to. Maybe nowhere, but isn't that a fabulous start?

Now let's get back to social media. You browse your Instagram account, you come across an account you didn't see before, you like the person in the pictures and you look around. You think about sending a message, say "hi". But not just "hi" that's lazy and you basically come across as someone who does this to every profile they see hoping to get lucky. But you like this person and you really want to start a conversation. You see a picture of a cat, so you type: "hi, I like your cat. what breed is it?" and just imagine where that conversation can go.  

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