ahem Kay deep breath, soul search. sigh
You see, I decided a long time ago that having a social networking site like facebook or Instagram was not only a waste of my life’s time, but also very toxic. This I learned first hand. You find yourself taking pictures of your surroundings or yourself with the intention of getting immediate or delayed approval of it. Either instantly giving you the self-high hit you were needing/addicted to, or an extended release version where you’ve composed an image of your life you want others to see. You tend to compare yourself to others and catch yourself saying, “well that person does BLANK or so and so seems happy…The time I’ve saved for my days where I would more commonly be revisiting how many 'likes' I’ve gotten or in paranoia, rereading all the things I’ve posted to hear myself speaking and come to a conclusion as to whether or not that’s the right voice everyone should think I sound like.
After time went by, I realized that there may be something in the growth and impact that societal woes sneakily force upon us. That without the pressure of people seeing your life and reading your every thought…you stop caring. You’re more linient with yourself and aren’t striving for any certain type of ‘you’ because really if you aren’t posting, you’ve died to the rest of the world. You wander in yourself and your actions because nobody can see you. Still in this realization…I did not reactivate.
But finally I realized something even more important.
Stacy and I met at the Starbucks where we worked. We became friends; part of a niche of people. All the while had our eyes on eachother. We got married in May of 2016 under a tree in a very green and tranquil park in St. Petersburg Florida. Our journey over the past couple months has been difficult, admittedley so; I would never trade it for the world. Stacy had a 5 year old boy who I had come to know within our friendship, but never spent time with until we got very close and ultimately decided that we wanted to spend our lives together. I then proceeded to learn how to parent. How to be something to both of them. and it hit me.
Stacy does have a facebook and an instagram like all the normal people in this world. She does scroll through it to pass the time and 'like' things that her friends and family post. I had become so used to not taking pictures, not sharing things, not writing, not posting. I had completely neglected to find a way to celebrate them. Not to sell and pitch what my family is like, but simply post something or share my pictures just because I was proud.
I heard a character, in a heavily dialogued show I enjoyed, say once that,"If it is not written, chronicled, taken by a scribe to record it, did it really happen? Have you created history? if nobody documents it?”
Is this True? does it fade out into time if not written down? It’s as simple as jotting down a grocery list or as complex as capturing a catastrophic global event by film. Time and memory fades…without history.
In an effort to celebrate them. Stacy and Connor…I found an outlet. I used to have a tumblr that I really loved and found comfort in. To blog. to record things without knowledge of who’s going to stumble upon it. This time I’ll have Stacy broadcast in on her own social sites so that friends and family can see it too.
This medium fits me best. Facebook seems too tedius and annoying. Instagram is too simple and I can’t write. This is perfect.
You’ll see our life, our photos, our food, activities, my thoughts, and Stacy has her very own tab for the things I want to show her or to send her love letters she can check into from time to time.
This is where I’ll showcase the family I love and how happy we are. Where I can show how my relationship with Connor grows and where I will keep a collection of our pictures while Stacy frames them up on the wall.