So I am all excited because I get a Facebook account, and I am finding all these old friends, and OMGosh! They want to be my friend too! And oooh! Look how popular I am. And myself-esteem takes a leap because I have, like, 60 friends!
And then I go and look at some of my friends’ walls and they have . . . 260 . . . 280 . . . 345 . . . 524 . . . Um. Wow. But, that’s okay. I’m just starting. I’ll find more people. They’ll find me. And, dude, I am writing on walls like I grew up all inner city.
And I’m clever and pithy and . . . there’s like this big lull in people returning my comments. And my friend requests are dropping to a trickle. So, okay, I finally get up over a hundred. But a LOT of the people I thought were good, you know, FRIENDS, are not responding to my posts. And my self-esteem starts to get a chin-tremble.
And then I think, Twitter! That’s it! I’ll start tweeting, and I’ll be so witty yet meaningful everyone will want to follow my Twits! Tweets! So, I create a Twitter account. Two of them in fact. And I start tweeting. Tweet, tweet, tweet. And then I sit on my little twitter-twig and wait.
And you know what? I get followers! I mean, it ain’t that many because, you know, I’m just starting out, but I am IMMEDIATELY getting followed. So I must be good, right?
And then I do a little research into my followers, and I realize that, while I am sure they are all very nice people, a lot of them aren’t writers, and aren’t mothers, and aren’t interested in the same things I am. And I think they are doing what I am doing: trying to get followers. Which is fine. But they’re not there because I’m brilliant.
As for Facebook, I realize that most of my friends have lives and aren’t counting on Facebook for their social fulfillment. Which makes me realize that there is a life outside of the computer. A real one. And while I use my MacBook a great deal for my writing and connecting, it is just a tool. Not a source of security.
I feel so much better after these realizations. Or I will, as soon as I recover from the embarrassment of the whole affair. One thing I know, I am never scrutinizing chocolate like this. Our friendship is tight.
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