Sometimes, the Real View is Behind You...

Facebook has turned out to be an interesting adventure. It's a place of quick jabs and soundbites, where all of us post quirky little quips and LOLcats in an effort to amass as many "Likes" as possible. It's a venue where instant gratification is the currency of every minute. It's a pseudo-social setting where thoughts we would have normally kept to ourselves or shared with a limited few in our immediate vicinity become available to hundreds, if not millions, of other Facebookers depending on our settings. It's a place where we frequently talk and share as if we're living, breathing bumper stickers.

For me, it's been a mixed bag. On the one hand, it's a lot of fun to stay in touch with friends near and far and to do it in nearly real time. It's a place where you see the joy and happiness and gratitude of so many friends and loved ones. It's also a place where you experience a lot of whinging and bitterness, anger and snarkiness, passive-aggressive jabs and just downright ugly slugfests. While I try to keep the things I post fun, uplifting, informational, and intelligent, I don't always succeed. I also know, I really struggle to keep my own snark, backstabbing, and passive-aggressiveness at bay.

I can't tell you how many times a day I'll start to write a comment on somebody's status update and then I'll delete it, because I know I'm being unkind or judgmental or just plain rude. It's everything I can do in some of those moments to not reach out and cyberly bitch slap someone and yell, "Snap out of it, you whiny, boorish prat!" or say something snide. Seriously. And, truth be told, I'm sure there are friends, real and friended, who want to do the same to me.

All of that is a long-winded way to say, I've decided to step away from Facebook for a little bit for the next week. Aside from posting my gratitude list each day, the occasional Instgram or Streamzoo picture, and articles of interest from the WaPo, CNN, the Beeb, the New York Times, etc., as well as links to these blog posts, I'm running silent and deep for the next seven days. I won't be liking anything. I won't be reading the latest in everyone's lives. I won't be posting the latest in my life. I can't imagine what that will be like, but I know at one time, that's what life was like. I'm going to try it again and see what happens.

Reflections : Plitvice, Croatia : May 2012

Photo copyright: Janet M. Kincaid. All Rights Reserved.