So I suck at keeping a blog. Okay. But if it counts, I have for some time now been thinking in blog posts and status updates. Baby did something cute, something humorous happens in a work meeting, somebody pisses me off, my mind instantly begins morphing it into a clever status update which is sure to delight my facebook friends and develop into a brilliant blog post that will fulfill some need for creativity not being met in my day to day duties. But it never happens. Instead, my dear FB friends get some obscure message generally indicating, in a lackluster way, that I've had a crappy day.
Why is that? Well I have some theories. And I've wanted to write a blog entry about facebook for some time. So here it is.
Because although some people are better at it than others (as in life, so it is in social media, well, sometimes), some friends are always amusing, interesting, captivating and generally able to hold our interest. But do you have to be that on facebook? I say no.
"But why?" you ask, "If I am not, then perhaps I run the risk of falling victim to the great friend purge of some guy I went to high school with who asked me to be his friend in the first place. I can't take the rejection," you cry. Well maybe not that last part. Maybe that last past only applies to some of us; I’m not going to point any fingers.
But truly, isn’t that the point of social networking? To be sharp, to exchange quick witted banter among people you haven’t seen in person for eons. To convince them they are missing out on your coolness or are fortunate to partake of it if only electronically. Maybe for some, but I posit for many people, facebook is the modern neighborhood.
I don’t think I’m the first person to think this, and I’ve read articles about the prevalence of electronic communication changing the structure of communities and relationships but to reassure you of my non-intention of plagiarism I quickly did a google search on “social media is the modern neighborhood” before I published this and it wasn’t on the first page so I’m just going to consider myself original.
See, I don’t belong to a “ward” and I don’t know my neighbors and my group of close friends has dwindled with marriage and family obligations to the point of being seldom accessible. And so I facebook. I know some people who say, “I hate posts that are vague like, “this sucks” or “things are so hard to face right now.” To them I say, why are you friends with that person? There is a reason they’re called friends, people. If you don’t like those kinds of posts, defriend them, add them to your LinkedIn account and carry about your business. Many people, rightly I think, don’t want to air their entire closet full of issues but could use a little pep talk or encouragement from their neighbors. And an ear willing to listen or a friend willing to chat can be identified by a brief, “hang in there!” or a “need any help, friend?” Additionally, I’ve discovered there is almost no better place to get a reference for a need. Wanna find a new restaurant, babysitter, dentist? One of your friends has one they’d love to recommend. And unlike your neighbors and family—in reality you chose these people. For the most part they have something in common with you.
Now that doesn’t mean, you don’t have the mix of that crazy extremely politically fundamentalist person, the uber guru of some sport or another that you have NO interest in, the ex that you told yourself you were a big enough person to accept and so on, in your neighborhood the point is that you CHOOSE to allow it. So go ahead and wish them a freaking happy birthday or tell them their kid is cute. But only if you want to. Sometimes, you’re outside taking the garbage out in your jammies and don’t care to be social. And sometimes, you keep it short, sweet and boring. Because you’re friends; you’re in your secure little neighborhood and you don’t owe these people your wittiness all the time.
And finally, a word about defriending. I’m going go out on a limb and say purging is lame. I don’t get it. If you don’t want to be these people’s friend, don’t ask. And if they ask you, don’t accept. Now granted, there are moments of weakness to trump all of this. I defriended someone once for a political comment using what I considered hate language. I wrote the person and explained why I made the choice and that while I was as up for differing discourse as the next gal, hate language only made me oblivious to the actual point they were trying to reach. This person thoughtfully found me email. Apologized and agreed with me and we refriended and remain so today. I have defriended a family member causing drama and someone who I was told was after me in a work environment. When it comes to your job mixing with your neighborhood—you just have to err on the side of caution.
Now to the accept side, if I made a mistake and accepted you and don’t know you. You may get defriended. If you know me but we just aren’t meshing, I will block your weird posts but not defriend you. And I do have to admit that there are some people I accept because I think that they MUST be going through the 12 step program and are getting in touch to apologize to me. That has never actually happened but I’m still waiting on a few.
Now, I’ve gone on and on and probably not really said much. At least I'm hoping that my thoughts will turn back into private points not abbreviated into concise messages for newsfeed consumption. Perhaps there will be an add on in the future addressing TMI syndrome, but for now I’ll end with this. I love my neighborhood!
