I Didn’t Unfriend You, or Aspartame Love

Recently I noticed that every day quite a few folks find their way over to N&D by Googling “lonely” or “loneliness.”

Doesn’t that make you feel sad?  That there are people out there who may be so lonely they have no idea what to do with it other than kind of search and find out who else out there is also lonely?  It makes me feel sad.

We are just so lonely, as a culture,  I think.  And we exploit it.  Everything around us tells us that buying a certain product or wearing a certain pair of jeans will somehow make us feel better.

Look look! I’m smoking Salems! And look how happy I am!

It’s just depressing.

Yesterday I was talking to a friend about Facebook.  He was saying that he recently read an article about how Facebook is really a rather depressive factor in people’s lives, because they look at it and see what everyone else is doing, and then believe that really, all of their friends are having more fun than they are.  Everyone is doing something, right?  So this tool, that was meant to bring us together and connect us, can really, on some level, tear us apart.  Which I think is true.  I mean, don’t get me wrong: I love a lot of what FB does.  It gives me a quick and easy way to feel connected to friends I went to high school or college with, family across the country, and even those in my own little city.  It gives a little snapshot into these people’s lives and lets me quickly comment and let them know I am thinking of them or that I miss them.  Plus it is often a source of news, a place to read articles and my friends’ thoughts, a way to find out about activities, events, and actions, as well as just generally enjoy the wittiness of those I love best.

But it is also is a time suck, something I probably look at too often throughout the day, and a distraction.  I have on more than one occasion been sucked in, only to realize later I spent an hour doing nothing more than flipping through a near stranger’s photos or moderately to highly moderately FB stalking a crush or reading some comment thread I hate but can’t seem to look away from.  And yet, despite the time spent on this little site that so quickly came to dominate our lives, I’m forever Not Having Time for something – the pile of books on my table, letters I mean to write but don’t, the friend I owe a coffee date to, a lecture, a show – the list is endless.

I guess my point is, there are all these things that are real – tangible and there, to be experienced and learned and done out in the world.  And I kind of suspect they may be passing me by while I check my Facebook app.

The world can be lonely.  Sometimes I feel lonely.  I think we all do, sometimes.  And maybe part of that is because we no longer really know who is in our lives in a meaningful way.  Just as that fake sugar can confuse the hell out of your body, because it is unnatural and unhealthy, I think Facebook can confuse our hearts and minds.  It’s a nice tool, safe in small doses.  But I don’t think it is the way we were made to connect.  And so is it surprising that it leaves us feeling unsatisfied?

I think we were made to be in community.  Real community.  Messy and frustrating and loving and seeping out at the edges community.  To have that, we have to take the time to be in each other’s lives in substantial ways.  For me, that means showing up.  There is no time I feel more safe and loved than when people take the time to be with me – when I know that I am a priority in their life, that my thoughts are interesting and worth being heard, that I am wanted, and that really, I am worth it, even when I am neurotic or annoying or Just A Lot Of Fucking Work.  I can’t get that from Facebook.  And I don’t think I can give it there either.  It is aspartame love, cloyingly sweet and quietly poisonous, tricking me into thinking I want more even as it slowly pickles my insides.

All of that is to say, I think I may need to take a little Facebook hiatus.  Not forever.  And not because it is bad.  It isn’t.  There is a lot of good in our favorite social networking tool.  But I want to develop better habits.  I want to rethink how I spend my time and mental energy.   Because clearly, despite the little ticker on my page, I do not have 823 friends.  I can’t even name one hundred people I talk to regularly, let alone eight hundred.   I have to believe that there is something more productive I could do with all those minutes – the five minutes here and there, which surely add up to hours a day, spent doing what – bantering in the comment section and reading about how the kid who sat behind me in fourth grade forgot to feed the dog today?

So I’m going to try and be better.  Quiet some of the background noise in my life in the hopes it will help me be a little free-er.  Help me remember to make the time to be a better friend.  Show up for people more.  Be more focused on what I am doing and the people I am with, not what someone else somewhere else may or may not be doing.  Spend energy on finding ways to let the people I love know it.  Invest in the things I love more fully.  Spend less time looking at my phone.  Spend less time looking at robots in general.  Spend more time doing the things I love and care about.

So let’s get coffee or go to the record store.  Maybe just read books quietly next to each other while someone else cooks dinner.  Let’s fight about our politics and talk about our families over beer and cards.  We can make things out of other things and use our hands.  Dig in the dirt or jump in puddles or sit by the water.  Let’s explore and climb those staircases you sometimes find going up a hill and aren’t quite sure where they lead and then get really lost in a neighborhood we don’t know.  Let’s ride our bikes late at night when the roads are empty and owned only by us and we can sing as loud as we want into the dark.  And let’s do it all in person and far away from any robots.  At least for a little while.