My Post Facebook Life
I’ve written in the past about some of the interesting relational things about facebook. And now…another one.
I’m writing this on the day where I write about relationships with enemies, but that might or might not be extreme for the topic today. You see, one thing that is fascinating about Facebook is the ability to be friends again with people you’ve been around in days gone by, in different eras of your life. This is great in one sense, because I love seeing friends I haven’t seen in a while. In another though, we must meet up with the realization that there is a reason we are no longer in that season of our life.
For instance, I grew up in the thriving metropolis of Fremont, Ohio. A set of my friends live there or know me from there. The theology was rigid and the music was bad.
At 17, I moved to Pensacola, Florida to attend college. A big number of my friends attended there with me. The theology was also rigid, but the music was good. By good, I mean professional as opposed to a type that I liked.
When I moved to Florida, my parents moved to Arizona, so during the summers I lived there. A small portion of my friends live or lived there.
After college, I moved to Atlanta, GA where I taught school and other odd jobs for the year of 1998. It appears that I have a lot of facebook friends from this are of my life.
Then I moved to Massachusetts in the middle of 1998 and have been here ever since. Meeting friends, seeing people move away. Meeting new friends.
I bring all this up because I wonder whether it’s healthy to have an eye on all these people from all these various stages of life. I’m really glad the technology exists, and I have become close again with friends from my past, and in some cases closer, but for the most part, it has been just a means of seeing that they ate chili this morning for breakfast or that their kid puked all over their back seat because of travel sickness. But here’s the interesting predicament I’m processing. I wonder if they (meaning my friends from a different era) like the ideal of the old Marty, who was sheltered and didn’t listen to rock music and didn’t say things like “crap” and “screwed” and who towed the party lines when it came to eschatology and the church?
Then I wonder if I’m just creating a new crop of enemies for myself by having a facebook account? I could just as easily write the names of the people who I’d really be in contact with, and get on with my life post facebook. Wow! That’s a lot to think about.
I’m just glad I didn’t grow up a Calvinist and jump out of those circles. I would be so screwed.
Related posts:
Perseverence of the Saints, Marty. We all know you’d come back around. Or maybe Limited Atonement is more apropos in this situation
I know the feeling though. I’ve had numerous “friends” from my past decide that my facebook profile is the apropriate venue to chastise and antagonize me based on my current socio-political views (which, of course, is considered by these folk to be my religious views) etc. Numerous times, someone has sent me a friend request, posted one or two things, then infriensed me when they realized that I’m not who I was 10 years ago.
Oh well, at least after they unfriend me, they can’t see my current location…
This is good stuff, Marty. I’m reading this on my lunch break
I’ve been thinking about the same thing. About whether people really are meant to be in your life for a season and how maybe facebook is complicating that and causing unnecessary turmoil. It’s interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing!
I think you’re giving facebook too much credit. I personally have enjoyed my facebook experience. Some people I have been thrilled to find again, others, not so much. I’m sure some of my “friends” feel the same about me. Well, then so be it. I think you are going to find a “new crop of enemies” wherever you go and whatever you do.
Hey Marty,
>
Your Calvinist friends couldn’t possibly get upset with you if you jumped ship. After all, it was pre-ordained before the foundation of the world and you couldn’t change it if you tried!
“Just a thought…..”
P.S. I’ve discovered that “a friend loveth at all times.”
But acquaintances….well that’s a different story.
I don’t know what you are talking about Marty. I checked the PCC website and everything there said they were pretty awesome.
I think it’s cool that u and I grew up “back in the college day” and shared in the same experience, yet now that we are older and involved in ministry, many of our views and convictions are similar once again.
Yeah, you are definitely much better off for having jumped out of the KJV-only circle at PCC. I’m surprised they haven’t stormed Fellowship Church and burned all the devil-inspired Bible translations you have there.
Face Book…Good or Bad? Does it really matter to the real relationships you currently have in your life? Marty…sometimes I think your perspective on your past experiences and relationships are as if you are the only one that has moved on.
Granted some of the people in your past are the same as they ever were …they will never change. But I for one am not the same person I was 20 years ago. I have moved on and so have many of the very people you reference sometimes. A visit for a few days to your past or a blurb on a face book account does not truly indicate where people are in their life.
You have moved on and want others to know that you are not the same Marty that is pictured above…what a better way to show the people from your past that your are different.
Is not demonstrating where you are in your true relationships a benefit of such growth?
Face book and this blog are great ways to do just that.