Cutting and Pasting vs. Writing

Facebook — the Great Communicator?

It happened. I got sucked into the Facebook mania. It started small. A fellow college professor suggested I create a profile to boost my 40-something “cool” factor with my 18-22 year old students. So I did. And I had a handful of “friends” – one being the professor who brought me in.

And it stayed that way, innocently enough, for a year or two. Until it grew. And it’s still hazy HOW it grew. An old friend from high school was on there. Then so was a former colleague. Then I learned how to “friend my friend’s friends.” And the Facebook phenomenon (FB) grew tentacles, and wound its way into the everyday fabric of my life.

I used to log on only when I had an e-mail notification that someone had written on my wall. I’d log on, write back, and log off. I knew it was a problem when I started logging on just to log on – to surf through my friend’s daily musings. “It’s a hot one today”, “Go New England Patriots!” and “Let’s throw Sarah Palin and her tea party into the Boston Harbor!”

And my own random musings began to appear – about my tennis game, my kids in the pool, and headlines I imported from the news.

So I’ve begun a weaning program that begins today. I’m willing myself to log on only when contacted first. To not get sucked in the world of chats and pokes at the expense of live, beating hearts in the rooms around me.

I’ve been trying, so far in vain, to find online the episode of South Park where Stew gets sucked into the Facebook world, and can’t get out. I’m told it’s a riot. If you find out how to view it… give me a poke.