Life is so complicated (and SO wonderful!) with all my new technology. I always have to think, should I Tweet this? Or should I make it my new Facebook Status? Do I want to take the time to develop this into a whole blog? Or is this really best-suited to an e-mail (or a direct tweet or a wall comment) to a specific friend? Sometimes, when I feel subtle I like to "like" something on Facebook. It's as if I'm saying, "I'm understated and cool and busy with interesting things right now but hey, I'm thinking about you and I 'like' this."
What I prefer is just talking to people. No one has time for that, though. I guess you have to "know" someone in order to get to talk to them. It's not like "following." Or "adding someone." I'm so wordy. I wish I lived in an epistolary era. But I don't. It's bad enough that I have a litter of foster kittens. I can't also start writing people long archaic letters right now. I mean, just put me in a white dress and call me "Emily Dickinson."
Basically I Tweet about what I eat, I Facebook about when I sleep, and I blog about Tweeting and Facebooking. But sometimes I Tweet about sleep, too. Like the other night I Tweeted "2 tired 2 Tweet." Imagine me saying it in a baby voice! Adorable, no? (I'm really hoping to use Twitter to highlight other adorable things about myself in the future.) Whenever I receive Tweets or status updates or anything like that I take it as a special message just for me. It's more fun and flattering that way. Like with Mindy Kaling (Kelly from The Office). I watch her on The Office and then the next day she sends me a Tweet about it. Pretty cool. We're friends. We're imaginary friends. No harm done.
It occurs to me that all of this is kind of strange and desperate. But I like it. Growing up I always had one or two best friends. Then as a married person we had to find couple friends--not easy. Now Mindy Kaling is my friend. Fantastic! Truthfully, it really bothers me that she doesn't care about me as much as I care about her. But I can live with it.
Social networking is a really great way to stay in touch with people and I love that. Then again, it's so easy to stay in touch with people that you don't really earn your friendships. Does it mean anything? Is it thoughtful to wish someone a happy birthday because Facebook told you to? I mean, it's certainly not thoughtless. But it's also not the same as buying me a present and bringing it to my house. I'll take what I can get and I'll be happy about it, of course. I just need to work on creating boundaries between myself and my online friends. Do you know how many seats I was saving at the movie theater for all the Twitterers who "invited" me to see Star Trek with them? A lot, but no one showed.
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UR makin me fill gil-T 4 not writin ou letters.
ReplyDeleteMy Dear Azucar and Bosom Friend,
ReplyDeleteRegarding the guilt you spoke of today in your comment and whether or not you should feel it: Upon consideration and with every hope that this missive finds you well and, indeed, leaves you well, I must tell you in no uncertain terms that you should.
Ever yours online and (occasionally) IRL, Kacy
I don't know what an epistolary era is. I'm too lazy to look it up. Show off.
ReplyDeleteummm, Kacy.....I know how it feels to follow someone and not have them follow you back.
ReplyDeleteahem.
totally know that feeling.
cough cough.
I appreciate your system of tweeting, facebooking, emailing, and blogging. You have created a fascinating, efficient, and organized program that is molded to fit your needs (and make me think about what I like. What I REALLY like.) This system will most assuredly win you friends The best kinds of friends. None of your facebook friends would ever, say, drop one of those foster kittens or make you wipe their kid's bum. It's flawless.
ReplyDeleteI am feeling sad about you sitting at Star Wars, waiting for tweeters.
ReplyDeleteI'm boycotting Twitter in favor of invisible mind rays. We'll see how that works out for me.
ReplyDelete"...it's so easy to stay in touch with people that you don't really earn your friendships." So true. Blogging and facebook are definitely reinforcing my lazy friend tendencies.
Think of it this way, Kacy. I think you and I have only met IRL once (Chris's birthday dinner at PF Changs, right?) but yet, I consider you a friend, mostly because I read your posts, your tweets and your status updates. Lazy, maybe. But efficient? Certainly.
ReplyDeleteIf we lived in the same state I might bring you an actual birthday present.
Josh, And if we lived in the same state I would have brought you an actual birthday present the day before.
ReplyDeleteEpistolary reminded me too much of episiotomy, and I got too scared to look it up.
ReplyDeleteYou probably don't remember me - Staci Duke from the old 'hood (I like to slip in lingo to show how cool I still am.)
Anyhow, your sister Erin pointed me to your blog and I can't stop reading. I love it! You are so funny, and you sound just like I remember you.
Please tell me you are planning on an ultimate fighter style showdown with Dooce.
I think you allude to some interesting points. In my estimation, most of the people we meet online and know only online are pseudo-friends, because we don't really know them. There are some exceptions, of course, as with anything.
ReplyDeleteA person can only spread themself [my word] out so far. While it's true that we're connecting on some level with various people, a good part of it is impersonal and more like a broadcast. It would be like knowing Katie Couric for watching the news, but only with her reading your blog and recognizing your name, even though she wouldn't be able to pick you out of a crowd. That's more the typical online friendship. A lot of it is artificial, which is OK assuming it's not relied on too much.
Generally, to truly connect with someone, you need to have eye contact with them, see their mannerisms in response to yours, hear their voice, see what they're like when the spotlight's off, and be able to have lengthy one-on-one discussions about what's most important to both of you.
As you hint, Twitter fills another niche besides that. Blogging is a good journal, and Facebook is good for whatever it is Facebook does (I don't think anyone knows yet).