Social Interaction Still Matters

OMG, I have been on vacation! My cell phone was down because of a lost charge! My Facebook has so many notifications, so much activity and I have tons of emails. I flipped to Twitter and the activity there is unreal. How am I going to catch up and which one should I tackle first? Hell, I will never have time to unpack or pick up the mail!  I need to go back on vacation on that cruise ship to get away from social media!!!! Help me, I am drowning on land! 


Emails coming in reminding you of birthdays for people you knew ten years ago. Then you struggle trying to remember who they are realizing why bother?  If you sent them a note,

they probably don’t remember you either and your wish doesn’t mean anything anyways!

Direct messages on Facebook and Twitter come from  total strangers of the opposite sex saying Hello. What the heck is that supposed to mean?  Let’s start a conversation from someone who is probably pretending to be a person behind a profile picture. Oh, are you so desperate for friends you will reach out to anyone and everyone.  If so, go stand in the middle of the street in NYC! That is probably safer.

Tweets that ask you to follow me and I will follow you. Why?  If you are saying anything of substance, I already would be! Now that you are saying that, you are showing the world you have nothing worthwhile to say except you are desperate for people to hear you say anything, even something as stupid as listen to what I say even when I am saying nothing of value!

What is the deal with Facebook forwards that say stuff like forward this to 20 people to bring good luck? Hell, you want to send me good luck, give me a lotto ticket! I have a much better chance of getting some good luck that way then you sending me twinkling stars or a picture of a doting angel and then harassing 20 friends with a chain message. Actually that is a sure fire way to piss off 19 friends!

Let’s forget talking live and communicate everything on texts on our phone. Then let’s hope the inflection of what we are trying to say comes across even though half or more of what we communicate comes across in our tone and it is completely lost in the written word. Nobody writes in text like a literary author so gone are the ‘missing you horribly’ or ‘sincerely hope you are having a great day’. Texts are written like computer programmers:  How RU?  Feel OK?  Nice talking 2U (insert 😃 face) Body language doesn’t show but it is substituted by one of the fifty emoji’s.🙏🌈⭐🚩🎸  End of conversation. Wow, that was rewarding, NOT

What is with the incredible long streams among many members on Facebook Group Direct Messaging that you have to run up and back down to figure out who the hell said what? Half the time I am responding to my own damn words!  Wow, does that look foolish but the stream gets so confusing. One time a close friend said, hey, I am starting a new group. It was the same group! She just said, unbelievable to me, I can’t follow this anymore or I will need to go into counseling. It is like hearing white noise to follow the stream any longer!

How many selfies can some folks take? Isn’t it easier to just look in a mirror? They are in your home, there is a rear view mirror in your car and carry one in your purse if you can’t stop staring at yourself. I don’t need to keep seeing you in my social media stream. I have news for you, day to day, you don’t change! You aren’t a baby that is going thru massive changes day to day in the development process. You don’t get bigger except perhaps in the waist line and if you keep posting them, perhaps in the head as in ego.  If you do get bigger in the waistline, or perhaps in the butt, do you really want the rest of us to see it?

Oh and selfies count as your feet. Please, post the pictures of the beach!  And men tell me, as far as your thongs (flip flops) if you are going to post those, post a real thong, They are a whole lot more exciting than your bare feet. Women, it is a misnomer that most men have a foot fetish! You may care about how your feet look  but nobody cares to look at your feet on social media posts. Let us feel like we are watching the Travel Channel and living vicariously through you, and that doesn’t happen by looking at your toes.

What is with all the unwanted emails coming in my inboxes these days?!  You unsubscribe from one site and in its place 5 others suddenly appear within days in the same category. Your name is being sold constantly on mailing lists and you have virtually no control over it. And the emails never make it to your SPAM folder anymore. If you are new to social media, you think you are the hottest commodity in social media overnight!

Be wary of filling out any questionnaire for politicians, even your favorite one! The minute you do, you become the top request for donations for that candidate and every email they send out on any and all policy issues they stand for! Heck, even if you post something negative on a politician’s site, which I have on several, I am now getting their emails even after unsubscribing. For some reason, they think, enough messages, they can change my mind. I may pay them to stop!

Balance out your posts. I love looking at a timeline on anyone’s page where I learn about the person and see inspirational posts. Why do some folks do nothing but posts links. I am not going to constantly read links. If I wanted to read the news constantly or other articles, I would go to google, or news site pages. Twitter is notorious for this. Someone’s page will be nothing but posted link, after link, after link. In the bio someone will say they are an expert. An expert at what, posting links to other experts in the field they say they are a Master at?  Yeah right.

I do believe in social media and I think it serves an invaluable service. The drawbacks are numerous and in many ways it has added a new dimension of stress to our lives. It has also eliminated needed dialogue to interpersonal relationships. That missing element is hurting families and friendships, no doubt about it. Be the change, as families lose that connect, children will suffer. Be sure you aren’t part of the problem but part of the solution. Remember use hashtag #SocialInteractionStillMatters!

Training Grandma on the Cell

 My granddaughter got all she wanted for Christmas this year,  a cell phone!  She was ecstatic when she saw it, more like in shock! We were blessed to be there this morning to see

her face. And now I am learning much about what it is like to have a 9 year old granddaughter who owns a cell phone….

• Kids raised in honest loving homes become confident children that tell it like it is with those they trust. As my granddaughter sends me occasional selfies, I decided, much as I hate mine, to send her one. Proud of me for actually hitting the button correctly without my son’s coaching, sitting in our car, off it goes without any photo editing. Note with no makeup either. Did I mention no make-up nor much time spent messing with my hair as a trip to Wal-Mart doesn’t necessitate doing that Follow up: “Grandma, what is wrong with you?”  Next message: Grandma, are you okay? 😞😟😭 You look different?”  Next day “ Grandma do you feel better today?” Next time we talk on a live phone call: “Grandma (laughing) what the heck did you do that day to yourself when you sent that picture. 

• Kids inherit the sense of humor of their parents and like to have fun with their siblings at their sibling’s expense.  One day, my granddaughter is talking about her doggie she 
  is loving on. She sends me cute pictures telling me he is not feeling well. 😨🐕 I then get a
  
  picture of her hugging him. Then, I get the picture of her darling brother looking like Chewbacca. 😀😊😎😄 Yes, his head is monster size for the size of his neck, his mouth is as big as a  dinosaur 😈and he looks rather grotesque! Apparently she has learned how to modify pictures and though she can send princess images of herself she prefers to make her little brother look like this!

•   She prefers pictures to long texts.  I don’t get answers back to long questions or get back “What Grandma?”  No way am I retyping it. I am bored rereading it, my own stuff, now that’s bad to even have to admit!  She just wants short stuff anyways.  She even asks me sometimes simply “Send me an emoji back”😍 Okay, my passion for writing is wasted on her. And she tires of my wordiness. But she loves pictures so pictures it is but no selfies, at least of me!  She is realizing now I am getting old in those pictures.  One day those tough questions will come.

• Then I get the occasionally text out of the blue at any time of day or evening “Grandma what are you doing right now?” 💭👂👀 I discovered quickly she didn’t find it that funny to say “Reading your text.”  Sometimes I am doing something I don’t really want to say in a text so just  I make something up!  I just find these texts the best. I think to myself, wow, I am so blessed! She is bored and we’re going to have a long distance conversation and as soon as I exchange a line or two she says “bye, love you”. I am dismissed, like that with an emoji.💓💋 She is  onto another text session with someone else! The life of a nine year old! Grandmas aren’t all that thrilling actually (insert sad emoji here)

• When I visited with her, it was funny to see that she found it easier to talk to me on the cell when I was in the same room than talk. Was that because it was noisy? Nope because as I looked around, everyone else had their cell phones or ipads too. We are a technology savvy family but so little time to talk live anymore its actually sad. I barely talk to my kids anymore, only texts. But, on the plus side, I must admit, living hundreds of miles away from her, these texts from my granddaughter are like the sun rising in the morning!

• A 9 year old has trained a 58 year old to carry her cell phone now to look for pictures to take.  I want to show her exciting things she likes so she feels she is with me. I hate the texts that say “Grandma I miss you” but yet I love them. So I need to share my life with her. So I look for parts of my world that will excite her teach her, and things I think her parents will want her knowing.   She keeps me young and I try to keep her knowing she is beyond loved, treasured no matter where I am.

Amidst a world full of turmoil and hate,

a little girl brings me into a happy state!

With a sound of a tweet,

I jump to my feet.

 I grab my cell

and pound the keys like hell.

Knowing she is waiting a while,

and when she receives it, she’ll smile.

Yeah, that cell phone was a gift. ☝👊😎Was it for her or for me?