FACEBOOK

On another note. I deactivated my FACEBOOK account the other day. Monday to be exact. I can't properly explain how it feels yet. WHY! would I do such a thing you ask. To be honest, it's a bit of a whim really. I know I looked at it too much and I know it was not genuinely enriching my life but also know it was not hurting me and it really was serving me to keep in touch with what was "going on". I just decided one night that I needed to see what life was like without it. This came with some contemplation about eliminating other things in my life that may or may not need to be excised or at the very least exorcised (which I will keep to myself and let you ruminate upon). So FACEBOOK had become something that I simply didn't think I wanted to deal with anymore and now it's gone. Now it's gone and I feel lonely. I feel lonely about not having that endless stream of crap flow in front of my eyes? No, wait now, it was not all crap. I loved seeing what my friends were up to and looking at pictures of cool stuff and finding out about what awesome bands were playing, all of that stuff was great. But somehow, in some way, FACEBOOK was making me feel sad. It was also fueling some sort of negativity that has been in my system for awhile that I simply can not put a finger on (or a face to). I think a lot of that sadness (and possibly the negativity) comes from the disconnection that FACEBOOK allows for. I was not really seeing my friends, I was certainly looking at cool stuff but not in person, and I certainly was not listening to the awesome music/events I knew about from the FACEBOOK. So, while I still felt connected to the things I enjoy, I was really not even connected to them at all. Now that this "feed" is gone I still feel the loss but really don't feel that hungry for it even though it is gone. Empty calories I suppose. 

I understand how important FACEBOOK is now to our culture, I especially see how important it is to a town the size I live in. Musicians, promoters, and organizations have NEVER had this amount of free power to get the word out to the masses. I guess that is a good thing but they still need the eyeballs on the screen in order for it to work. I think FACEBOOK is like a lot like American cheese. For me, American cheese is very useful for a few things (which I will keep to myself and let you ruminate on) but for the most part it is tasteless garbage with no depth or necessity. There are three ways you go with the American cheese/FACEBOOK analogy: 1. I use American cheese on everything. 2. I would not eat American cheese unless I was stitched into a human centipede and the person in front of me ate American cheese. 3. American cheese is OK every once and awhile but I sure wouldn't want to eat that crap all the time. Wow, now I want to do a FACEBOOK/human centipede analogy. 

So here I am FACEBOOKLESS and wondering what I have learned so far. I have learned that Google+ is  a cold and dreary place to come to kick a social media addiction. I have learned that I have a need and desire to "connect" to the world in some way (and we all know what the Buddha said about desire!) other than through screens no matter how great or how small. I have learned that losing distractions generally makes way for more of them. 

You can now find me on twitter at @x_mortician or at Instagram under the same moniker. I will also be setting up a food blog soon where I will regularly illustrate what we are having for dinner that night. To go with that blog I will be doing a regular podcast on Friday nights to showcase what I listened to on Spotify. That show will be called "American Cheese" and will be hosted by Soundcloud (or Basecamp, I can't figure out which one has more subscribers). -X

P.S. OH GREAT! I think my mom is now reading this blog. Hi Mom! Happy reading! Did you get the human centipede reference? You should check it out, it's on netflix!