Is There Anybody There?

I heavily rely on social media to get through my day.  Assuming I'm not late to get somewhere, the first thing I do each morning is respond to messages and Snapchats over my breakfast.  Later on in the day, I'm writing posts to promote my radio shows and sharing around my latest blog posts.  Finally at the end of the day, I might throw a picture up on Instagram and make sure my snap streaks aren't dying before I drift off to sleep.  My phone never leaves my side, and my social media accounts are always logged in and generating notifications.

After reading that, some might think I'm online too much.  My answer to that is "Absolutely".  I have so many people that I talk to for various reasons from back home or here in town that I'm on the phone a lot, especially when they're snapping or texting back and forth constantly.  Plus doing things like writing blog posts and browsing good old Reddit takes up time as well.  And then there's music research for the radio shows.  Jeez, when will I ever put the phone down and/or close the laptop?

I feel like my head is stuck in the digital world a little too much sometimes.  There are times when I'll see what someone is up to on social media via the website's news feed and think that said person has their life all wrapped up in a nice little bow and is destined for success, and I've come to find out that's not always the case, if it even was in the first place.  This has even happened to me after seeing what my colleagues on LinkedIn are up to.  Trust me when I say it's not worth your time to worry or get jealous, because it was never worth mine.

A trip to Washington recently gave me a nice break from the digital world when I was able to get out into nature, even though I took a boatload of pictures throughout the two weeks I was gone out that direction.  And here in Fargo, work serves as my distraction.  It's 7-16 hours a day where I'm not supposed to pull out and use my phone and my computer is back at my apartment and I'm not seeing or paying attention to anything online.  I only do it on my breaks, and sometimes even that doesn't happen if I get lucky enough to have a human conversation or have to go make phone calls and hold a conversation that way.

When I need to break free of the digital world, I head to the grocery store, go to the laundromat, or even rent a bike from downtown.  These activities may require my cellphone at one point or another, but usually for these types of activities I'm able to leave it be in my pocket, which is supposedly bad for you but I never broke the habit (shrugs). 

When I am using my phone or my computer for business or pleasure, my favorite method of digital communication is text messaging.  It's the easiest way to get ahold of someone, gets spotted much faster than your standard email, and takes only a few seconds to a few minutes to compose.  The ability to send anything from words to GIFs is amazing, and when you have a good conversation going it gets even better.  You're laughing, or helping someone out with a broken heart, and you end the conversation(s) feeling like you've accomplished ground and found a common point of view.  For me at least, being able to help someone out via messaging is something that gives me peace and a sense of accomplishment in a time where I need to be finding things that give that end result in the first place.  I also appreciate those who have helped me out over text message at one time or another.  If you're one of those people, thank you so much. 

Sometimes, a text message gets read and not replied to, or a Snapchat isn't returned.  Many a good conversation gets cut off when this happens, and after I realize the person on the other end of the conversation isn't replying ever again until one of us next text first, I feel like I'm the one who ended the chat without even realizing it.  Hmmm... I must need to find something more compelling to text about next time, if there even is a next time.

It can feel like, when a conversation ends unexpectedly, that you're tapping on the window or knocking on the door of an empty house and shouting, "Hello?  Is there anyone there?".  You keep knocking or tapping, but not another sound comes out.  You consider sending another text message, but quickly decide that's borderline creepy and instead choose to slink back to your car and leave the premises by closing out of the conversation and going to another page.  You feel defeated, but you have to move on and not let the small stuff get the best of you ya know?  I didn't at first, and it sucks, but when you find the right people who reply all the time, it gets better, trust me friend. 

When people quit responding and I still need to take care of things, I either buckle down and focus on the task at hand, or go about my next task and come back to the other one later.  Or, I start another conversation with a different person somewhere else online.  Simple isn't it?  I've found that turning my attention towards someone or something else helps remove the negative connotation of thinking you were the one who caused the chat to end. 

Somehow growing up, I got this belief or ideal that all conversations needed to be carried out to a finish line of sorts where both of us thanked each other for taking the time to talk to the other person and we agreed to talk again soon.  It's something I've always tried to stick to as life goes on, but sometimes admittedly I drop the ball too and fall asleep or get called away and forget to respond the next morning.  I feel awful when I accidentally quit replying, and so I'll try to apologize the next time we pick up a conversation whether it's in digital format or face to face.  I sense the apology doesn't always smooth the negative effect I have left, but I still feel like I did the right thing by apologizing.

Whether accidental or very much intended, I think it's quite mean to leave someone hanging in a conversation.  Do I think it's a big deal or the end of the world?  No.  But, I do feel that we need to start, carry on, and subsequently end our conversations in all the mediums we conduct them in.  No, we don't really need to respond to a message that says something like "ok" or "sounds good" (I've totally done this in the past and it doesn't work at all), because that's like beating a dead horse to try and make it get up and gallop away, and it makes you look very clingy to a certain person, sometimes so much that they'll just go ahead and take the easy way out and block you so you can never reach them online again.  But if someone says something like "Yesterday my homies and I went to get freezies...." and then tells a story, we shouldn't just drop the ball on them.

In the same vein, I feel that one word answers are absolutely terrible for use in text messaging.  The only time I text words such as "k", "ok, "yup", or "alright" without follow-up or lead-in words is when I'm falling asleep at the keyboard or the plans are set to go and the conversation can end without leaving a major hole somewhere about your plans.  So yes, I'm guilty of this too, but I want to change that as well.

Let's go back to social media, and the iron-strong grip it has on me these days.  Will I ever fully shake social media?  No, because it would be detrimental to me getting the word out about my various endeavors, and I would wipe out multiple connections with people I've known for years, dating all the way back to my infancy.  I've gone without for a few days from time to time, but I couldn't shut everything down and go cold turkey.  However, I do feel like I miss a lot of connections with real face to face people from spending so much time in front of a screen doing the various things I do.  I could use to get out more and meet people outside of my work circles, but I don't find much time.

Unplugging is very much needed, at least for a full day here and there.  We're not really spending time with ourselves when we're reading everyone else's social media profiles and posts, rather we're just chewing up time with a rather meaningless activity.  Social media has it's fun things, but it shouldn't take the place of our daily work and family lives.  Instead, I feel that it should be a supplemental thing to what we're doing on that specific day, posting pictures included.

Over the next few months, I propose this.  When we're not using technology for business purposes, we keep our use to a minimum and get out and explore the people and places around us by foot, vehicle, or bike.  There's a big world out there, and we don't deserve to miss it because we're too busy with our fancy devices.  Time is something we don't get back, and we can't let tech keep taking it away.