The Last Non-Facebook Person On Earth

I realize that perhaps my title is a slight exaggeration. In fact, I know that it isn’t true because my friend Jani—stalwart companion in this lonely and perhaps futile resistance—is also not on Facebook. And I imagine there are probably about five or six others out there who remain Facebook-Free as well. But because it feels like everyone else and their mother/sister/brother/
cousin/coworker/childhood sweetheart is on Facebook, it seems like the few of us who are not should form some sort of support group. We could help each other learn coping mechanisms on how to deal with feeling left out of all the wonderful things that seem to be happening on Facebook—all the latest details we don’t know about because we can’t access our friends’ pages, not to mention all the inside jokes and references. We could figure out how to respond when a friend excitedly exclaims to a group, “You have to check out the photos of my trip that I posted on Facebook,” and then turns to you and, face falling, says, “oh, that’s right. You’re not on Facebook. Well, maybe we can look at them on my computer sometime.” And, of course, you know right then and there that you will never see the photos from her trip.

So why, many of my Facebook-loving friends would ask me—have asked me—don’t you just sign up? Be part of the group! And from what I hear, Facebook is fantastic. You can reconnect with people from college, high school, and even elementary school. You can find people in your area who are reading the same book as you or who like the same bands. You can get an instant snapshot update of someone’s life with whom you haven’t spoken in years, viewing pictures of their husband and kids, and learning 25 things about them that you never knew before.

But here are my issues, or at least my issues related to joining Facebook: first, I am constantly finding myself struggling to keep up with the people I already have in my life. I can instantly name at least five people off the top of my head at any given moment that I wish I could spend more time with and get to know better and more deeply. And I am constantly dogged by a low-grade level of guilt for not keeping in better touch via e-mail or phone calls or get-togethers with any number of people. As much as I would like to, I literally do not have enough time to know all the people that I know, and there have been times when I have actually longed to live in an era where people traveled by horse and wagon and had no phones. That would automatically narrow the number of people you could know and interact with, which, in my mind, would mean a simpler life and quite possibly deeper and more meaningful relationships. It would also mean wooden outhouses and no electricity, but that’s beside the point.

To be honest, though, I am torn. There is a part of me that has all kinds of curiosity to know what happened to so and so from way back when and would love to see who they are now and what they’re up to. And therein lies another issue: my tendency towards obsessive and compulsive behavior. I can see myself quite easily losing hours of my life avidly cruising other people’s pages and, because I am also a very conscientious person, feeling obliged to respond to anyone and everyone who posted a message on my wall (I think that’s what it’s called. See that? I’ve actually picked up some of the lingo because it’s so pervasive). So then I’m in touch with dozens of former students and former classmates and former friends and we’re all connected and they’re lovely people with interesting lives and we have so many things in common to talk about and share, and while the thought of that is appealing in some ways, it also completely stresses me out and makes me want to seal myself inside a sensory deprivation chamber.

When I’ve raised this issue to those trying to convince me to join, their response is that I can limit who my “friends” are and only accept those I really want to be connected to. But that means I’d have to reject or not respond to some people, and while I’m not sure about the specifics of how that works, it seems like it could open the door to some awkwardness. And the last thing I need in my life is more awkwardness—I generate enough of that for myself as it is. And furthermore, wouldn’t the friends I’d link up with be the friends I already e-mail and call and get together with? Why would I want to add an additional venue when I already feel so constrained by time and can barely respond to e-mails, watch the YouTube links I’m sent, call someone back, or (gasp) write someone back by hand? (yes, people who write cards and letters to each other and send them in the mail still exist). They would probably answer that it would actually save me time and facilitate keeping in touch, which might very well be true. I could get updates about their lives with a quick scan of their page. I could post a short note and receive one in return on my page without having to write out an entire e-mail or pick up the phone. And there is something very appealing about that as well. But I worry that for a person like me, someone who already struggles with being too much of an introvert as it is, this would provide an easy out from genuine connection and exchange something real for something canned. Something would get lost. Or at least that is my sense of things, irrational as it may seem.

Lastly, I must confess that some of my resistance is pure ornery-ness. I occasionally get stubborn about things that everyone else is raving about and dig in my heels. I felt a strong antipathy towards Harry Potter for years, refusing to read any of the books based solely on the rabid enthusiasm everyone around me seemed to have, until I finally broke one day and read the first book. I pretty much had to since a student gave it to me. After I read it, I had to reluctantly admit that I kind of loved it and proceeded to read the rest of them, even going so far as buying and reading the final book the day after it came out. Perhaps, someday, I will finally weaken and become another Facebook convert and kick myself for not joining sooner and be embarrassed about having ever written this essay.

But today is not that day...