Morning Thanks--Friends

It's not that I don't know, at least in part, the ever-present danger of "doom-scrolling." I've read enough of it to understand the violence social media can inflict. 

It's not that I don't understand that my own use of social media--which is significant, I might add--tallies facts about my life I'm not otherwise willing to give up, which is why some say of social media, "You're not the customer but the product being sold." I get that. I know that I'm "being served" to the crunching that goes on at Facebook or Twitter. 

I understand the fact that incredible logorythms deliberately make us horrified about something--some behavior, for instance--because we're already hard-wired, it seems, to react most eagerly to anger. I get it that manipulation is not only an effect but even the point of things.

I know something of the social shaming that goes on on-line aren't a flaw of social media but a built in facet of their design, the what-for of their very existence.

I've heard the Jeremiahs claim that the public are little more than "logs thrown on silicone valley's fires," and that the judgments we make before the many screens we've set up in in our homes not only determine how we use our "spare time," but come to affect, by their incredible power, how we behave even when we're not on-line. 

I'm listening to a book I heard about on NPR, Four Thousand Weeks (a clever way to talking about the span of our lives), in which Oliver Burkeman makes all-too-painfully clear that social media's power in our lives is not simply that it detracts us from what we might think of as more important matters, but comes to define, for us, what we consider "important matters."

I'm not blind. 

I'm old, but I'm still capable of listening to the those minor prophets of our time sound their endless "woe and woe and woe."

I know. I know. I know.

But when my birthday rolls around, it's social media that puts a lays a hand on my shoulder, smiles brightly, takes me out for lunch--honestly and truly.  My family's best wishes not withstanding, it's Facebook that has me shaking my head, not just for the sheer volume of "happy birthdays," but from the museum of my life all those good wishes build right before my eyes: old friends, new friends, facebook friends, ex-high school students, ex-college students, family (close and distant)--just about every last "happy birthday" flashes a story I can't help but remember.

The truth is, I don't need to die to have my life flash back before me--I just need a birthday. Facebook brings by a host of well-wishers, and I can spend half a day reminiscing. I know this: when you're scoring your 74th birthday, Facebook delivers a gift that's a blessing.

So this is to say "Thanks" for the hundreds of well-wishers I heard from on Friday. My birthday was a real treat, a joy. You made it so.

This morning, y'all are my morning thanks!