It all sounds so…final…*Bum, Bum, Bum!!!* So very “CIA” / espionage-esque…I dunno. But what I DO know, is that this special agent is overwhelmed, and is looking for the words to describe what she is feeling. Heck, she would even be happy to know what her real name is! All she knows lately is her calling card from this crazy online world where they speak in terms of “spyspeak”.…”That’s Miller…Andy Miller”…and I am shaken AND stirred as of late it seems. So, that would make me Agent 00something…but what?
As I glanced at the Facebook page, with the glaring option to “Deactivate” staring me down….another D-word came to mind. DRAMA. I’ve realized that, in the midst of this self-exploration (and * not so * quarter-life crisis season of life)…I have grown an appendage. I now have two “faces” in my life. One physical, which (apparently) can be read like a book (often causing embarrassment to no end, and not to mention making me a complete liability at the poker table!), and the other, an inanimate, glamorously glittering movie-star status mugg…a countenance I can best only describe as an “online airport” of sorts (people-watching to no end)…pun intended~
Now, I don’t know about you, but I was taught in grade school (mostly out in the schoolyard….during recess…from much bigger/ older children…by a soaking wet swirlie…a wedgie…a swift kick in the pants…or a pride-stinging slap) that being two-faced was NOT something desirable. Hence, my dilemma. What to do with this new limb?
Is it something that can only be survived by completely severing its presence? I tried this…and was left feeling legless…disconnected from my body…limping along. The “amputation” left me feeling as if I was lagging behind my peers. Worried that I would be disqualified from the race because I was not registered as an “official” runner…with a number on my back...or was that an official page? (I digress.)
I had to come away….and yes, it is extreme, this deactivation. But sometimes I find it necessary..because then it allows me to extremely delve into WHAT it was in the first place giving me the idea that I needed a break….WHAT was so overwhelming to me? With facebook, there are so many things I could pinpoint. Do not get me wrong…I find it neither evil nor good as an entity unto itself. It just “is.” Much of Facebook’s power, I am realizing, lies in what it becomes (or is allowed to become).
It can become the black hole…a vortex of swirling, mixed messages coming at us from all angles…offering many things, yet most of which come up empty. Since this is a blog with which I have promised to use myself as the main fodder…I will only speak for myself (no judgments or projections upon anyone but this 00something). What began to bother me most was that I found myself coming home each day, and the very first thing I checked was my page. I would rush to the notifications and the messages, the little child inside begging the question…*who loves me?* and *someone message me some small encouragement, telling me it is all going to be okay…assuring me that I am going to be okay!*
For one inanimate object (my little trusty laptop) to have so much power (real or created) is no longer acceptable to me. For me to be (either) validated—or completely deflated….based on the mere presence (or absence) of a tiny little red flag at the top of a blinking *bleepin’ * screen, is self-defeating and masochistic. I need to no longer run home asking the question: “Who loves me?” and "Will I be okay?" but rather carry around with me always the answer: I love me...and I am better than okay.
So, now for the hard part…working on that answer….everyday…more and more.
Activate.
