To FB or Not to FB, THAT is the Question...

For only five short, bold, beautiful minutes. Unscripted and unedited. We just write without worrying if it’s just right or not.



Today's Word:  Connected
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One of my very dear friends, the one I share the pear tattoo on my foot with, decided last year to delete her Facebook account.  Her reasoning?  It made life more impersonal.  Birthdays are filled with meaningless wall posts instead of cards and phone calls.  Couples are FBing each other across the room instead of talking.  Family members are lurking on your page instead of asking how you are.  I see her point, but I feel this is how the times are.
If we go back twenty years, FB was around, it just wasn't called that.  Birthday cards were the wall posts.  You might get a card in the mail, but all it is is a Hallmark signed by your Aunt Betty.  Nothing personal....  Couples, especially those just starting in their relationships, passed notes to each other.  Remember how we all used to fold those into little puzzle squares?  ...And family members lurked in their own ways.  They meddled in your affairs by gossiping about what is going on in your life, and those "affairs" they speak of are ones that they "heard through the grapevine."
To me, Facebook makes connecting so much easier.  I don't like to talk on the phone.  I feel awkward and don't know how to talk.  In fact, I feel that way quite often about talking in person too.  I call it "socially awkward".  I've always talked and communicated better through writing.  Facebook has given me the opportunity to develop relationships so that I do end up feeling comfortable "irl" ("in real life" if you aren't into the computer age shorthand) when talking to them.  My good friend, Erica, is a great example of this.  We've known each other for years, but never talked until about a year ago over Facebook.  Now she's one of my favorite friends to do things with and lean on when I need a shoulder to cry on and to be there when she needs one too.  Plus, I love her kids and her family.  They've adopted me in a sense and it makes me very happy to be able to enjoy events with these people instead of feeling like I don't belong.
I like to share my photos, my goings-on, my writing, my sense of humor, my actual real life and not a through-the-grapevine rumor, with all of my friends and family.  And I like to be part of theirs as well.  
I'm sad that my friend left FB because now I get bulk emails that she sends to her entire family, links to a third party online album to view pictures of her kids, and I feel obligated to get on Twitter to follow her feed, but I have to sift through all the celebrities I check up on when I am bored (and that's like once a month really).
So connect away, my dears!  You don't know who is smiling because they see your pictures and posts every day!
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