Becca Rowan is a writer and the author of Life in General, a collection of essays about mid-life as experienced by an American woman in the 21st century. Becca loves creating connections by sharing stories on her popular blog.
It feels like I’m getting a New Year’s do-over.
We’ll be leaving the sunny skies of southwest Florida tomorrow morning and heading home to Michigan, where I hear a fresh covering of snow awaits us. I haven’t seen snow - or felt cold winds or seen gray skies - for almost seven weeks. It’s possible that I’ll go directly into shock, or at the least into an emergency case of Seasonal Affective Disorder. Interventions may be necessary!
So, the other day in a blog post I wrote about “cutting the cord” on social media (Facebook and Twitter particularly). I wrote that I although I value social media as a “big village green” or a place to connect with people from so many walks of my life, I felt that in the current political climate, it was feeding my anger and frustration and affecting my ability to get on with life in a positive manner. I wrote about using the month of February to “detox” myself from Facebook and Twitter, in favor of engaging in old-fashioned personal communications like handwritten notes and letters and I invited readers to be my “pen-pal” of sorts.
The truth of that post is this: I wrote it about six weeks ago, when I was sick and tired of my own terror over the state of the new world order. I wrote it when I was angry and totally disheartened. I wrote it when I had maybe had one too many glasses of wine on a dark December day. I scheduled it to post at the end of January, and then completely forgot about it until I started getting comments about it in my email box on Friday.
For some time, most especially since the election, I have felt the danger of social media. I recognize my own obsession with it, an obsession I desire and despise in equal measure. What I have loved about it is the ability to connect with people who aren’t within my physical realm, people I don’t or can’t see every day. I like knowing what they’re up to, I like seeing pictures of their family parties, hearing about the books they read, knowing their triumphs and tragedies - all the things we “post” on our FB pages. I realize how much I need this connection. I realize that this need arises from a deep-seated loneliness I don’t always want to acknowledge. So I’m drawn to this central location, this big virtual village green, place where I can express my “status” - how I’m feeling, what I’m doing, what’s happening in my life - but also a place where I can find out the same things about all of you.
“I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness, and the willingness to remain vulnerable.” -Anne Morrow Lindbergh, A Gift from the Sea
If suffering alone did teach, we would be so very wise right now, wouldn’t we? For it feels as if this year gone by has delivered more than its fair share of suffering.
My own world was rocked with suffering when my mother died in March. By late summer, I had lost count of all the people in my circle who also lost a parent this year. (At last count it was 22, and I think the final sum must be well over 30.) I lost a younger friend to cancer, and an even younger one to suicide. Not to mention a host of celebrities who died in 2016.
