Facebook a mural of holiday letters

My Facebook biota is full of people browsing, reluctant to contribute, unwilling to extend and be vulnerable.

That makes it less compelling to me. Still valuable as a news feed. Still good for bursts of life’s most presentable aspects scrubbed and groomed like sentences from family holiday newsletters. Feels like a shift more to posturing, less personal bravery. Even under pedestrian expressions (“Hey, gotta make another trip to the grocery store! LOLZ!”), chthonic frustrations can be readily detected (“If SOME people had planned a little better I wouldn’t be going to this goddamned grocery store again and having a SUPER-TEDIOUS conversation with the same clerk who will remark on how I’m back again 20 minutes later implying that I don’t have my shit together!”) – but I don’t want to have to work THAT hard.

I still like it for the quick-hit sense of interpersonal geography. A map of where people I know are, what they’re doing. Expands my sense of the breadth of the world – traveling to and from work can be a existential tunnel.

Many brave friends who have been willing to be vulnerable and articulate have burned out on Facebook and dropped off that mental map. Frequent thought of late: “Why is the News Feed less aesthetic, more anesthetic?” Several still hold on, the depth is appreciated (especially you who got notice from me about this blog – thank you).

Whittling down the list of Facebook friends might help. My list is too long, and I hear from people over and over they appreciate my posts, but they never interact with me. “Thank you!” I say to the compliment. “Grrr…” I say inwardly about these lurkers.

That dynamic has an advantage from a public relations standpoint, but what I’m perhaps yearning for is contact. Or solidarity with other people with peculiar brains. “Peculiar” = perceptive and honest. Life is damned peculiar, being peculiar shows attunement.