I am really starting to hate Facebook. I like it for the ease with which I can communicate with family and friends, but I am starting to feel like the cons outweigh the pros. Everything tech is bringing me down lately, I see so many people come into the cafe and sit together, eat a meal, and almost never interact with each other, as soon as they've ordered they break out their devices and are scrolling and thumbing away. Sometimes, they barely look away from their screens to interact with their server. I can think of few clearer ways to let someone know that one feels that they are not important.
Yet, as I'm sitting there watching them, judging them, I have to wonder how it's different from a couple taking out books and reading, or a child playing with Legos while his parents and siblings talk. But something tells me that it is different, and that it's not good.
Now, back to FB, I've posted about my FB-started relationship debacle of 2010, and my meet up with the woman from HS that I thought went well, but apparently didn't, but it just seems to keep getting weirder. A friend messaged me a couple of weeks ago and asked if I was in a relationship. This happens every now and then, and I always respond with a bit of a fib. "I'm not sure...I'm in a long distance thing that hasn't really gotten serious, but I kind of feel like she's just keeping me on the back burner," I'll write back. It's not an outright lie, I do still text, or message the friend from HS. I would very much like that to turn into more, but she's a long way away, and we've only seen each other twice in three years. And then there's Sam...yes, she still pops up from time to time to stir the ashes and stoke an ember.
So, my friend has a friend and believes that she and I would be a great match, that we are almost exactly the same, except that she has smaller feet and bigger hair (I fervently hope that there are a few more differences as well!) and that he'd arrange an "introduction" if I was interested. I answered with the standard above response and asked if it was someone local, as he used to live here. No, it was someone he worked with in his new town, which puts her even further away than the HS friend.
I really don't know why I don't just use names, any one of the people involved in this stupid post would be able to recognize themselves in it.
What the hell, I thought, just because we chat back and forth a bit on FB doesn't mean that we have to ever move on to anything more. We may just swap book and movie suggestions and that's all, and there is nothing wrong with that, there doesn't have to be any more. So, we've exchanged an introductory FB message and I've looked around her page. She's very pretty, is smart, and seems cool. I think if we were in the same town, or even the same state, we'd have a shot. As it is, I don't know.
And then there are the other messages, not the "are you seeing anyone" variety, but their fishing cousin, the "I've always had a crush on you" message. I fucking hate those. Usually, the time stamp is early in the morning, so the writer is probably drunk, and now I have to figure out how to respond. The other night I got one from the wife a friend. I did not want to know that. I don't want that in the air next time we're all together, and it will be, and she couldn't just let it go at that, she had to follow up with the "I hope I didn't make you uncomfortable" message a couple of days later. Guess what, if you have to say that, then there's a pretty good goddamned chance that you made someone uncomfortable.
So, I'm sick of it. To be honest, I think I'll change my stock response to enquiries about my relationship status to "not interested, perfectly happy alone, and the longer I am alone the more convinced I am that I'd be a horrible partner...also the thought of meeting new people and having to go through all that small talk and getting to know them just depresses me. The thought of having to meet their friends and families at some point is even worse. Oh, I've also always had a psychological erectile dysfunction that, though it does go away after I've been with the same woman a few times, is not getting any better with age and makes the initial experiences depressing, confusing, and terrifying. Thank you for thinking of me, though."
