Does Silence = Abandonment

I live in a world where communication is available through multiple media and at low cost... Well... low cost to my way of thinking, anyway.
I have the Internet on my computer which means I can go into Facebook and make a video call to another Facebook user, assuming that he/they/it/she also subscribes to Facebook and has the messenger capability. I have a cellular phone that can call any number in my country. I've blocked international calling. I have a landline that can receive calls from anywhere on Earth (and probably from space), but can only make local outgoing calls (again, another self-imposed restriction).
I have limited subscription to communication applications. There is a Whats App on the phone, but it almost never gets used. I don't like to be bombarded by these programs as they seem to have a mind of their own even though they are artificially intelligent. There is jarring, invasive warning that I update or upgrade the program (regardless to what may or may not happen to my chit-chat history). Then there is competition from other pseuto- or Ersatz telephone applications that want my business. Some have catchier names than others.
And don't get me started with the Siri / Alexa pair. Who know what either of those would do if you verbally ask it to dial a number for you.
...
I have this friend named D Patrick. I've known him seemingly like forever. I met him sometime between Rodney King and the Menendez Brothers news. He answered a personals ad. He ghosts writes. He must be very good/prolific at it because he travels a lot and never seems to do much of anything else. But, as you might have guessed, the ghost writer gets no credit. So, I never know what he has written in his life with the exception of an edited movie script and a vanity-published book.
I call him from time to time. I leave messages on his cell phone. Sometimes the calls have an American ring and at other times they have a European ring. I dread the latter because I worry about waking him. Why should I worry, since he never picks up.
Less often I might leave a text message (that's what most people call email that you send to a cell phone via a program called Message). I call it 'email to your phone' because I have noted that it pisses off most people who want it to be called 'text' 'texting' or 'text messaging'. Sometimes I do email him.
Most of the time I get ignored.
Never sure if he's busy. Never sure if he wants to hear from me. When he does pick up, he seems genuinely happy to talk.
These days I'm thinking that maybe I just need to drop him (save, of course, for the annual xMas/winter holiday card wishes).