ON QUITTING FACEBOOK
Tonight, putting my son to bed, I revived an old tradition of singing with the guitar at the bedside, one by Woody Guthrie and another by Dylan. Sure enough he relaxed into the rhythm of my rudimentary guitar chords and was sleeping peacefully minutes after the last note of Only a Hobo (his request) …. Naturally, conditioned to do so by the social media-dominated culture we live in, I found myself wanting to share this private moment with everyone of my “friends” on Facebook. But I recalled quickly that this is just one of the reasons I decided to pull the plug on my Facebook site this afternoon. Sure, I would get several “likes” and a few supportive comments, and the public documentation of my kids’ and my own life would continue unbroken. That in itself is not a bad thing, but at some point I just felt that enough is enough– need to cast aside for now the endless overt and covert marketing strategies, the trivial postings of who ate what when (and who sang their kids to sleep), the humble brags about accomplishments and achievements couched in false or ironic modesty, the endless notices about every good cause or fascinating political essay posted by people who may or may not have read them themselves (guilty there too). So long, it’s been good to know you…. besides I am not social media deprived, as this blog attests, as do my newly revived Instagram and various other outlets and public storage units.