So, first day without Facebook in 5+ years. It is… weird. Exacerbated by the fact that I stayed in my shoebox size room all day researching for a paper. As any college student know, Facebook is the perfect procrastination tool. You go on there to see what your friends are up to for a few minutes, and suddenly you don’t feel so alone. The last time I had no access to Facebook for an extended period of time was the first few months in Cameroon. But even then, I had crappy cellphone Internet connection that would allow me to have a few minutes of peek a day. Ironic that even in Peace Corps Africa, a time of my life when I thought I’d be most isolated, I was connected.
When I want to procrastinate, I sign onto gchat to see who is around, poke my head into Twitter. But my gchat list is limited and most people on Twitter I don’t personally know, making the stalking less interesting. Not to mention, the content that I could actually browse now require me to use my brain – articles and blog posts – not funny comments, photos, etc. A few times throughout the day, I actually caught myself opening a new tab in my browser and key in f, for facebook. I think this is what they call “muscle memory”. Strange.
On the upside, I was pretty productive today. And although I do feel considerably more alone, there is relatively low chance my emotions would be affected by anything I read today. That’s sort of nice. Sometimes, Facebook can make me feel like I’m standing alone on an island, waving my hands hoping someone would notice me. Let’s be honest, that “like” button serves this purpose.
And just as I’m about to say Facebook is designed simply to fuel our narcissistic souls, I get an email from Peace Corps St. Louis asking me to join their Facebook page. Suppose I’ll have to wait a few more weeks.
Until tomorrow…
I just went on a hiatus. It's quite the elaborate plan and involves a third party. Basically I changed all my settings so only one newly-created email address would allow me access. And then I gave my friend the password to both my fb and that email account and asked her to change all the passwords. Uploaded a cover photo mentioning I was on hiatus and if anybody wanted to get in touch they could do so through my Hotmail.
Now, I am gasping for breath and hurling and googling 'facebook hiatus'. Day 1.