Eighteen

Likes

In my last post, I wrote ad nauseum about the highs and lows, contemplations and revelations of being an active Facebooker today. The primary thing that keeps me coming back again and again to the addictive little pain is the connection to other friends near and far. There’s that word: connection. In the hectic, sometimes claustrophobic world of a part-time working, middle-aged mom, connection feels more important now than ever. 

Aside from the general connectivity Facebook affords most of us, deep within its “Likes” and emoticons and memes and videos of sharks dancing at the Superbowl, there are delightfully juicy and groovy specific examples of human connection at play. Any Facebook user knows what I’m talking about: instances that make you want to share immediately with others in the room or that cause you to giggle aloud when you’re sitting alone in a coffee shop. Moments of “No Way!” coincidences or heart-tugging sweetness. Pictures of old friends who now look more fantastically gorgeous or woefully bedraggled (or a combination of both) than they did when you last saw them face to face. Teensy weensy threads in the broader web that trap us with their sticky appeal.

A recent example, so you can get what I’m trying to say in my rambling. This story is just so cool that I had to share. Through Facebook, I keep in touch with a friend of mine from a publishing job I held 20 years ago. My friend is a gifted painter, editor, writer, you name it. And he’s got a great wife whom I adore. He’s also a little older than I am, and he’s jam packed into all of his years activities, jobs, travels, and more that are also just so cool. Recently he wrote about an experience he had as a “liquor delivery driver” in Los Angeles many years ago. He mentioned that at one celebrity’s home (whom I shall not name here since it’s not my story), he was instructed to leave the liquor at the end of the driveway, at which point the celebrity would wave down and say, “Just leave it down there,” the actor would yell down from a random spiral staircase up the driveway.

My friend, let’s call him John, posted this the other day in connection with a mutual friend’s new project. Just so happens, however, that one of John’s friends just happened to be on Facebook and saw John’s post. As it turns out, John’s friend’s dad knew this celebrity back in the day, and his friend had BEEN IN the celebrity’s home once or twice when the liquor was delivered! He remembers the celebrity calling down to the liquor delivery guy (John!) and telling him to leave it there . . . so he wouldn’t have to tip him!

John responded, of course, to this crazy, crazy coincidence, made even crazier by the fact that we live across the country from Los Angeles several full decades later. For me, it was a cool story. For John, it was an exhilarating story, one that also answered an age-old question: Why did I have to leave the liquor at the bottom of the driveway?

I’ve seen old elementary school friends post pictures of long-since-forgotten Halloween parties (with me dressed like, of all things, a cleaning lady, standing next to a drink-swigging hobo). We, the friends in the photo, had a full “discussion” in the comments section, and I’ll be damned if it didn’t feel pretty close to hanging out with them. People I know from around my huge neighborhood simply by passing them in a school hallway or beeping at them as I drive by have the ability to make me laugh out loud simply by sharing a Jimmy Fallon video or making fun of my dorky ways. Seeing my friends’ kids grow up on screen may not be as good as giving them hugs in real life, but it’s pretty damn close. Dozens of ways each week, I see, feel, read, hear, marvel at, and yes, even occasionally roll my eyes at these little threads in the web.

Believe it or not, I feel like I’m getting to know the folks around (and not around) me through little “likes,” “dislikes,” status updates, and other correspondences on Facebook, and I really like that feeling. Like being connected to a community, making my great big giant global existence feel a bit smaller, a bit more understood. Sorta like college, when, for the most part, we had no heavy duty worries or responsibilities weighing us down. All we “had” to do was hang with our friends, act like idiots, and laugh. For me, that’s the gift FB gives me: a little escape time.

I encourage others to give it a try. If it annoys you or if random crazy folks (and they are out there) start to post mean things on your wall or rant out of control, either de-friend them or get off the ‘Book. But I think you may like it. It feels good to be connected, after all.