My hands are wet as they type these words. The sounds of rain outside my window. Children on the nearby playground shrieking with delight. A sudden Hawaiian shower in late afternoon…
If I could imitate Gene Kelley, I would grab the nearest lamppost, hoist myself up on one foot, spin around, singing:
“I’m blogging in the rain,
just blogging in the rain,
what a glorious feeling,
I’m learning the social media game…”
But I’m lying.
That’s absolutely not what I wanted to do! In fact, I leaped up, away from my Skype social media 101 class for the over 50 online-challenged crowd, wildly frustrated and upset.
What the heck is a tweet and why do it?
140 characters for what frickin’ purpose?
Friends requesting they follow me… why????
Am I being virtually stalked?
Am I myself becoming a twittering, glittering tweet-machine?
So I slammed the Apple laptop shut and charged outside, head dizzy with Disqus and avatars and gravatars and usernames and weak passwords.
I walked with focus and determination past tree after quiet tree. Past bird after chirping bird (it gets tiring using the tweet metaphor.) And I started to calm down. Take deeper breaths. Notice my mind slowing and slowing, my pace slowing, my eyes relaxing, my ears opening.
Cars. Wind. Dogs barking. A muted shout. A plane overhead.
Luxurious, real, three-dimensional sounds.
I continued walking past bleached concrete walls covered in purple-green ivy. Past five foot long brown palm fronds that look like combs for giants. I walked beneath darkening, overcast skies (yes, even in Hawaii we have gray days).
But at least it’s real.
I began to think about the difference between this world – this world of shy, noisy weed-whacking Filipino landscapers and cream puff summer clouds and sticky pink gum on the bottom of expensive Nike sneakers – versus the other world – the online world of clean, sleek, shiny, fast. They are galaxies apart. When I think about computers and the Internet, I think lightning:
Hello to my publisher in London. Hello back to me in a heartbeat.
The astonishing technological wonder of email.
But what’s the true cost? At least to me? I step into this invisible stream of lightning fast internet energy and I am knocked down, bowled over, swept away, like the twenty footers on the North shore that snap the expensive surfboards in half like toothpicks. I’m gone sometimes for hours and hours on end. And I wake up in a bleary techno-stupor, a virtual hangover, disconnected, confused…
(to be continued)