Cindy on January 25th, 2010
As a culture, I see us presently deprived of subtleties. The music is loud, the anger is elevated, and sex seems lacking in sweetness and privacy.” — Shelley Berman
Last week I told 325 friends on Facebook that our bedroom in this old house is torn apart for remodeling and looks like a mess. Later that same day, I announced that I was making pea soup for dinner. (Earlier in the month, as part of a dubious “campaign” for breast cancer awareness, I also posted the color of my bra in my status update.)
I haven’t even met some of these Facebook buddies — so I’m asking myself why I’m compelled to do this.
Touching on a Facebook issue in Newsweek earlier this month, a journalist confessed that she tries to avoid “over-sharing” on social networks. Likewise, a friend of mine recently asked: “Is there such a thing as ‘personal’ anymore? Is any topic sacred?”
My friend was referring to her co-worker’s latest blog post — a post in which the co-worker over-shared intimate details of her love life. As my friend put it, “Blogs and social media are sucking the mystery, romance, and privacy out of everything. Everyone’s a publicity whore.” I had to smile at her use of the words mystery, romance, and privacy — words that seem to have gone the way of the manual typewriter. But she has a point.
As a writing coach who specializes in memoir and personal essays, I’ll be the first to defend the importance of sharing our stories. Sharing stories is how we connect with our fellow humans — and crafting those stories beautifully makes us artists. We glean invaluable lessons when we read memoirs, autobiographies, blogs, and essays by gifted writers. When handled with care, the personal can be universal.
But I wonder if we (as a culture) need to rethink what’s fair game for public consumption? How far “out there” do we need to be? How much do other people need to know about us — and why? If we wouldn’t dare include a personal detail or episode in an essay or a memoir, is it really appropriate for a blog? For Twitter or Facebook? Exactly what are the dangers of over-sharing?
Writing a weekly newspaper column early on, I learned the hard way when I’d crossed the line and violated the tender privacy of loved ones. My son, who was often mentioned in my columns when he was much younger, taught me to think carefully before exploiting a person — or a topic — for the sake of entertaining or amusing my readers.
I’m quick to add here that I seriously enjoy connecting (and reconnecting) with friends on Facebook. And keeping a blog is almost as much fun as writing a weekly newspaper column.
Still, I’m intrigued that so many of us today are driven to share our deepest yearnings and secrets with virtual strangers. At the same time, we complain that it’s hard to forge true emotional intimacy with others — in person. As a writer who covers lifestyle issues for magazines and newspapers, I can’t overlook the paradox. Women’s magazines thrive on this very topic.
So what is it that compels so many to unload information that was — in the past — considered rude (or just plain foolish) to parade in public? I open this topic for discussion here. Please share your thoughts in the “Comments” section below. – Cindy La Ferle
– Photo above: Detail of “Box of Secrets,” altered art piece by Cindy La Ferle –
Cindy on September 18th, 2009
There’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.” — Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
Somebody once said that high school is “the mouse race that prepares you for the rat race,” and I suppose there’s a glimmer of truth in that. Like a pair of cruel shoes, my high school days were among the most painful in my life.
I attended a public high school in the early 1970s. In those days, especially if you lived in a small Midwestern town, conformity was key. So there I was, a flat-chested drama club nerd and closet poet in a school where accomplished jocks and curvy cheerleaders ruled. Social life typically revolved around Friday night football or basketball games — but I had to fake any interest in sports. Trying to fit in, I tried out for the drill team but was chosen as an alternate, which meant I had to make all the practices and learn the routines, but I didn’t get to perform at the games unless another member was ill.
Come to think of it, I felt like an imposter throughout most of high school.
My real definition of “teamwork” was shopping for props and costumes for the school plays. And I adored the drama teacher. Not surprisingly, a lot of kids snickered behind his back, secretly questioning his sexual orientation. I still credit him and my humanities teacher for making high school bearable and interesting.
But the English teacher took a serious dislike to me. Of course, it didn’t help that I sat with chatty classmates and talked too much in literature class. Regardless, this teacher doubted my budding writing skills, and wrongly accused me of plagiarizing a term paper on the subject of medieval chivalry — a subject I loved and read about voraciously. She nearly flunked me out of senior English, which pulled my GPA down a peg or two. Not to mention my pride.
In other words, in high school I received little encouragement for the things I truly loved and excelled in. To their credit, my parents had tried early on to send me to a private school that specialized in the arts. I had been courted and accepted by the arts school, but chickened out at the last minute.
Before I go on, I need to insert here that I met some of my very best friends in junior high and high school. I also began dating Doug, the sweet guy who’d later become my husband (and still is), in my sophomore year. You’d think I would consider those years The Best Ever. But they were not.
Twenty years after graduation, I remained so embittered by my high school experience that I wrote a downer of an essay for the Detroit Free Press Sunday Magazine. The essay chronicled the awful time I had at the high school reunion Doug and I attended in 1992. Unfortunately, the reunion took place a mere three weeks after the sudden death of my beloved father, and I was in no mood to party with anyone.
Reading between the lines now, I realize that the Free Press essay (which is reprinted in my book, Writing Home) really wasn’t about the 20-year reunion. Though I wrote about feeling awkward in a roomful of grown-up classmates, my unease had little to do with them — and everything to do with repressed grief and the ghosts of my own insecurities. More than anything, I think I was trying to explain how sorry I felt for the creative girl inside me who had struggled to emerge in high school.
So it might come as a surprise when I tell you that lately I’ve been reconnecting with former schoolmates on Facebook — and genuinely enjoying it.
It all began last year when I found Robert, the free-spirited guy who played opposite my lead in the all-school play in 1971. My favorite memory of Robert is the time he and I staged a protest after one of our dress rehearsals got canceled on short notice; we’d been told to move our entourage elsewhere, since the school auditorium was needed for an athletic event. Enraged, Robert and I led a small march (I think there were four of us) to the local school board, ranting all the way about how sick we were of playing second fiddle to the basketball team. On Facebook, I was thrilled and proud to discover that Robert had moved to Chicago, where he became an award-winning journalist and author with several fine books to his credit.
Of course, once you crack open a few pages on Facebook, it’s hard to stop.
Before long, I started hearing from other schoolmates. Earlier this summer, Colleen contacted me to ask why I had stopped writing my column in the local newspaper. I was flattered to learn she’d been reading it for years. When she “friended” me on Facebook, Colleen said she wondered if I would remember her. As she explained it, she’d been “a rebel” in high school, and we didn’t hang with the same crowd. But I did remember. And even though I was a drama nerd, I’d always secretly admired the “rebels.” Unlike the jocks, who were too frigging cool to dress up in costumes, some of the rebels had the guts to try out for the school plays.
From beauty queens to band nerds, my classmates are a fascinating bunch now, and I’m proud of them. Their profiles and family photos reveal that they’ve crafted rich and interesting lives over the past 37 years. One is a psychotherapist; another is a fitness instructor; several work in education, finance, and medicine. Some even share my political opinions, and it’s been fun airing our views in private messages. Others, having been through their own share of medical crises, are at the ready to help with mine. Last week, when I mentioned in my Facebook status that I was struggling to find a neurologist for my mother, several friends sent recommendations — complete with addresses and phone numbers.
All said and done, midlife is a lot more fun than adolescence. It makes us kinder to each other. It sharpens our perspective and thickens our skin — wrinkles and sags be damned.
Like my classmates on Facebook, I’ve endured several crises and turning points, and these have shaped the woman I am. I’ve given birth to an amazing son, come to terms with the loss of my father, and, more recently, watched my only uncle die a slow death from pancreatic cancer. I’ve survived two hip replacement surgeries and learned to walk again. I’ve driven my elderly mother to emergency rooms, and watched my son graduate from college. I’ve happily celebrated nearly 30 years of a nurturing marriage.
But it’s been years since I’ve cared enough to keep score. Grades, trophies, contests, degrees, salaries, and other so-called measures of achievement or popularity no longer mean much to me. Best of all, I’ve finally made peace with my inner drama queen, who now finds expression through writing and the visual arts. I give her free reign now. – Cindy La Ferle
Painting at top: “The Lady of Shalott,” by John William Waterhouse; The Tate Gallery
Cindy on December 6th, 2008
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” — Mary Oliver
So, I asked a newly retired newspaper columnist if she’s planning to start a blog — especially now that her work isn’t appearing regularly in print. I’ve admired her beautiful writing for a long time, I told her, and would happily read anything she cares to post.
“Does the world really need another blog?” she shot back, adding that it’s hard enough to keep up with her e-mail — not to mention Facebook, Twitter, Gather, LinkedIn, and all the other “distractions” online. “Who in the world has time for all of that?” she said. “Now that I’m retired, I want my real life back.”
My columnist friend got me thinking about how much time I’ve been spending online in recent years. After putting in two or three hours (daily) on writing projects or assignments, my routine goes something like this:
- Answer e-mail
- Work on posts for various Web sites (including 50-something Moms)
- Update status on Facebook
- Visit friends’ blogs and leave comments
- Surf the Web for juicy political articles
Before I know it, morning has morphed into afternoon, and I’ve only left my desk to refill my coffee mug. Hanging out in cyberspace was perfectly fine — even ideal — when my son was much younger and needed a stay-at-home mom. But the kid is 23 now, and lives five hours from home. Besides, even when he was in middle school, the Internet didn’t monopolize my time.
So what did I do with my “one wild and precious life” before a keyboard became part of my anatomy?
I accomplished so much more. For starters, I generated a lot more article proposals for print publications. I read more books. Met friends regularly for lunch or dinner. Started and completed more art projects. Rode my mountain bike, took longer walks, or worked in the garden. Explored local businesses and flea markets. Pored through cookbooks and tested new recipes on my appreciative family.
Like my retired friend, I want that life back again.
Trying an experiment this week, I limited my “social time” on the computer to 45 minutes per day. (That includes checking e-mail, surfing, and visiting blogs.) At first it felt weird, since I’ve been compulsive about checking my e-mail several times a day. But soon I felt happier, more creative — and liberated from the tyranny of my computer. I felt as if I’d finally seized control of my free time.
During that free time this week, I made a few simple Christmas gifts for friends, then completed an altered art project to enter in upcoming exhibition. After cleaning my art studio, I picked out a pretty note card and wrote a heartfelt message to a college room mate. (Imagine her surprise when she gets snail mail from me!) Later in the week, I cut evergreen branches to decorate the empty planters on the porch. I called my mother more often, just to talk. I even had time to plan a small party for dear friends whose December birthdays typically get lost in the holiday shuffle.
Once again, I began to appreciate the sacred in the ordinary.
My late father used to talk a lot about the importance of life balance. “Everything in moderation” was one of his favorite catchphrases, and he used it whenever the topic of substance abuse or addiction came into the conversation. This fall, I realized that my computer use was bordering on obsession or addiction. And like any addiction, it was impacting my attitude and relationships with the most important people in my life. I knew I needed to come up for air.
I truly enjoy posting blogs and following colleagues on Facebook. I love surfing the Net and making new discoveries, new friends. And I love reading the blogs of other writers. I can’t “quit” entirely — but from now on, I’ll try to spend less time hugging my computer. – Cindy La Ferle
Please note: I’ll still continue to post essays, short blogs, or announcements at least twice a week.
Last week I told 325 friends on Facebook that our bedroom in this old house is torn apart for remodeling and looks like a mess. Later that same day, I announced that I was making pea soup for dinner. (Earlier in the month, as part of a dubious “campaign” for breast cancer awareness, I also posted the color of my bra in my status update.)
But I wonder if we (as a culture) need to rethink what’s fair game for public consumption? How far “out there” do we need to be? How much do other people need to know about us — and why? If we wouldn’t dare include a personal detail or episode in an essay or a memoir, is it really appropriate for a blog? For Twitter or Facebook? Exactly what are the dangers of over-sharing?
