Facebook, let’s have a talk. Twitter, you listen in, too.
You both have so many virtues. Really, you’re both great. You show me so many things, and I can’t quite imagine life without either of you.
But let’s just stay friends, nothing more. No more impossibly late nights. Let’s try to limit the compulsive checking-in that happens almost all the time. See, with perhaps a few exceptions, I just don’t think anything beyond a casual friendship would be healthy, at least in our personal lives.
Much as it hurts me to say it, that goes for both of you.
And while we’re being real here, let’s just say for the record that it’s not me this time. It’s you. Definitely you. Both of you.
An older, grayer party has helped make me wise to your ways. In her pages last month, The New York Times explained that perpetual over-stimulation of the brain can inhibit the learning process. Researchers have found that if I spend too much time with you, I might compromise my ability to digest and process fully new experiences. I might not be able to remember life’s nuances so well if I’m forever tangled up in your digital glow.
If I’m too wrapped up with you, the Gray Lady tells me, I might not give my brain enough downtime to come up with fresh and exciting ideas.
Which, ironically, could make my Tweets less and less interesting on those continued occasions when we do rendez-vous. You know what I’m trying to say?
Wait — don’t turn away. I mean, I don’t mean to disparage you entirely. Look, there’s a lot of opportunities for us — all of us — to keep working and playing together.
Facebook, few things connect with the Penn State student body and recent alumni like you do. You’re like an electronic glue; you help to bind us together, keep us updated on one another’s whereabouts and milestones. You seem to know where all our old friends are. You’re willing to relay messages and photos. You help distribute news inexpensively and intuitively, from both individuals and organizations.
We Penn Staters are among your heaviest users, we’re told, and you seem to adore us right back. There’s a fruitful friendship there; let’s not wash our hands of that.
And, Twitter — well, as a group, we haven’t been quite as into you yet, but we’re getting there. Our Interfraternity Council/Panhellenic Dance Marathon cracked your global trending topics last year, and we’re still feeling out the extent of your redeeming qualities. You manage to blend local conversations with international news and trends, though you also tend to be a little vapid at times.
Actually, Facebook, you’re not always a picnic on that front, either.
But these are issues we can work on — together, as friends.
It’s just when we let you become too demanding, too much of a constant, unyielding presence — that’s when we have problems.
I’m staring at you both when I’m walking through town. I’m tempted to look at you when I’m driving up Atherton Street. I go for a walk in the woods on a Sunday, away from your electronic tentacles, but I find myself yearning to return to reception ASAP. You overpower me. You don’t leave me alone with my thoughts. You encourage me to over-share, to fill other people’s heads — and waste their time — with my most useless nonsense.
Sometimes you make me feel obligated to give, to come up with something, to post anything — and sometimes I just don’t want to. Sometimes I need just me. Sometimes you interrupt far too much. (Although — to be fair — that’s partly on me, because I let you.)
Seriously, we can fix this, F and T; we can make this work, just in moderation. It’ll be better for all of us.
If we enjoy one another in moderation, I won’t come to resent you, and you won’t gorge yourself on my brain power.
In the long run, that’ll make for more interesting Tweets and Wall Posts. My self-loving wit, that way, will come across better in your electric glow.
And isn’t that what all three of us want, anyway?
