When I was younger I thought like this. As I got older, and my thumbs fatter, I tend to answer it if I'm expecting a call(windshield replacement at the moment), or a contact, or just curious. If nobody ever answers, then I'd never get to talk to my parents, and I value that time so make time pretty much no matter what I'm doing, within reason.

I don't hate texting, but strongly do for some use cases. I was trying to get directions from a friend recently via text and it just became... annoying. Something like

me - ok, which building is it I'm outside

wait

them - you see the red one?

me - yes, is that it?

wait

them - ok it's two down from that

At this point I called, because I'm not going to text and wait again to ask left or right(above example is not exact, but similar to this).

I think texting is great for saying hi, or asking a question. I do not in any way find it useful for conversation or back and forths. Just my .02.

I do wish phone numbers weren't guessable items but something more like, say, long random addresses so that companies couldn't just flip through dialing anyone and everyone. I haven't thought out how discoverability would work though without something like DNS.