TO FACEBOOK OR NOT TO FACEBOOK?

That is the question.


For years I have avoided the whole Facebook scene.   Friends and relations would ask "Why aren't you on Facebook?  We could keep in touch."  


Did your phone break?  
Did the postal system go out of business?
Do you not have my email address?


These are the questions I would like to ask.  But I don't.


I know it is easier to post little snippets of life on Facebook and instantly you have communicated with dozens or hundreds of people.  It's convenient, multi-tasking, and efficient.  I get it.  But I just wasn't interested.  It is a strange world in which you can friend and de-friend with a click of a button.


So recently my own dear husband, the one who emphatically used the word NEVER and the words, stupid and time wasting when discussing Facebook, has recently joined.  (For business purposes mind you.)  But he decided to drag his wife along too.  I now have a Facebook account that was not set up by me, but by a man in a Singapore hotel room halfway across the world.  Weird!


For the last 24 hours I have been poking around on Facebook and at the risk of alienating many dear friends, I have to say that I'm even more convinced - it is such a bizarre way to communicate.  Too personal, yet not personal at all, at the same time.


Magazine articles, TV shows and experts cry out ... 


        "simplify"  
                              "downsize"   
                                                     "be authentic" 
                                                                                 "cast off excess"
                                                                                                               "live in the moment"


And yet in the past 24 hours my email has been flooded with "notifications"  from people I don't even exchange Christmas cards with.  Everywhere I go people are texting, tweeting  and talking on cellphones and ignoring the people around them.  I realize I'm in the minority here and maybe it sounds harsh but that just doesn't seem like simplifying to me.  And honestly sometimes its OK to lose touch with people.


I'm a nice person but I just don't care that my neighbor, from 2 moves ago, is on her way to Wal-Mart to get milk.  And (sorry honey!) but I don't care to receive a notice that my husband just posted that he likes JAD Speciality CO.  And I think its strange that I can see that my husband's cousin's wife just sent condolences to a friend of her's on the death of one of their relations.  HUH?  WHO?  


Now I realize I may be a hypocrite. I pour out my heart and post personal stories and photos here on my blog that anyone could potentially see.  And I will go ahead and complete my Facebook profile and post a few photos.  I was able to get back in touch with my college roommate Kari last night and it was nice to see her family and receive her personal message.  So maybe Facebook does have redeeming qualities. 


But please "defriend" me if I ever waste your time by letting you know I'm out of toilet paper.