Everyone gets frustrated with Facebook. Some of us say too much. Some of us say too little, trying to make everyone guess what we’re feeling so we don’t have to spell it out for our 400-ish friends to see. We roll our eyes in frustration when we see posts that abrasively oppose our beliefs and insult our intelligence. We may take the bait and put our two cents in, even when we know it won’t change one ignorant mind. In fact, we are all the ignorant ones to someone. We’re all pissing each other off with politics, prayers, and e-cards. We get annoyed when people are all posting on the same thing. We get annoyed when people get annoyed with people who are all posting the same thing. We squint, lean it, re-read, and shout “SERIOUSLY!?” in our offices or living rooms, then we screen shot the idiocy and text it to our best friend for backup. We seethe at the friends we’ve grown apart from as we watch them move on. We lament over other people’s vacations and cute babies. We stalk our exes. (Admit it already.) It’s astounding that any of us are still hanging around that spiritual wasteland, but I think I know why we do. Because even though there’s a LOT of bullshit, there’s also something else that we as humans all crave.
Community.
I think that’s the key. I can scroll through and at any time, day or night, be engaged with someone I (probably) like or admire on some level. It’s comforting. Maybe more so for me than some, because I live with 3 kids and it’s nice to have access to people who can wipe their own asses (I hope). So I tolerate the stuff that makes me mad, just like everyone else. I try not to get into much political talk on there anymore. I didn’t post one thing about Obama this year. I didn’t start any crap about Mitt Romney and his binder or the ridiculousness that was the women’s healthcare debate. I haven’t given my opinion on gun control. I’ve kept my mouth shut, and really I think the only reason is because it makes me so angry when I see opposing beliefs that I know it takes away from the whole experience of Facebook. I’m just not comfortable posting the rants that are in my head in that little box that simply asked “how’s your day been, Heather?” That little box doesn’t want to hear all that, and most of my Facebook friends probably don’t give a crap, either. So I decided today, after reading
this, that I would start a blog again. It’s been a long couple of years with no blogging, because I was hiding from it. I lost whatever bravery I used to have to share my guts with the world. I’ll still keep a lot of it to myself, but I want a place I can write, and share, and connect again. I want to own a little corner where I can say what I think and not worry about offending anyone, because, hey, it’s my blog. It’s one thing if I’m busting up your newsfeed, but if you click the link to these pages and get mad about what I’ve said, then that’s not on me. I feel good about it. I hope it works out for me and the 4-12 people who want to read it.
This could seem self absorbed or pretentious. Pretty much anything you put on the Internet can do that. But the truth is, I miss writing. I don’t think I’ll ever be famous. I’m not trying to write a book (although I’d love to). But I really, really love it and because it’s one of the only things I’ve never gotten tired of doing, I have to keep at it. Writing for the magazine has been incredibly inspiring as well, but nothing really beats the inspiration that comes after seeing someone post something so inane for all the world to see that it’s all you can do not to break your keyboard over your knee. I’m going to salvage my MacBook, and let it out here instead.
And also, this:
so you want to be a writer?
by Charles Bukowski
if it doesn't come bursting out of you in spite of everything, don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your heart and your mind and your mouth and your gut, don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours staring at your computer screen or hunched over your typewriter searching for words, don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or fame, don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want women in your bed, don't do it.
if you have to sit there and rewrite it again and again, don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it, don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody else, forget about it.
if you have to wait for it to roar out of you, then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you, do something else.
if you first have to read it to your wife or your girlfriend or your boyfriend or your parents or to anybody at all, you're not ready.
don't be like so many writers, don't be like so many thousands of people who call themselves writers, don't be dull and boring and pretentious, don't be consumed with self- love.
the libraries of the world have yawned themselves to sleep over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of your soul like a rocket, unless being still would drive you to madness or suicide or murder, don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is burning your gut, don't do it.
when it is truly time, and if you have been chosen, it will do it by itself and it will keep on doing it until you die or it dies in you.
there is no other way.
and there never was.
What he said.
