Sometimes I love technology and how interconnected the world is, and sometimes it drives me mental.
Being able to easily stay in touch with long distance friends has been my saving grace in the initial months after each time I’ve moved to a new place. But sometimes it seems to elongate the heart break.
Today one of my friends in one of my previous homes told me she is getting back into things and was explaining when she would be home and when she would need a baby sitter.
How I wish I could be there to look after her baby while she and he husband are out of the house during the day. I have a flexible schedule, sometimes, I could’ve made it work once or twice a week.
I love that kid and my friend. Can someone invent teleportation already!
Technology also enables my “what could have been” day dreams.
When I moved from Pincher Creek to Campbell River my best friend took over my old job. Talking to her almost every day it felt like I could see down the path of “what would have happened if I had stayed?”.
Social media can play a big role in this as well. There are times when I have some serious fear of missing out. When I see photos of my best friends in other cities at concerts or events that I would have gone to if I had still lived there, it makes me question all of my decisions.
Even the initial decision to move away from home and the subsequent decisions not to move back. I can talk to my parents on the phone every day and I still feel like I am missing out.
Because yes, I need to be challenged in my career and I aspire to be the best journalist I can be and live my best life, but love… that is the whole point. How can I keep moving away from it? Not that I don’t find love everywhere I go but, how?
And then there is social media and my job.
Sometimes it is fun to interact with the audience and share stories online and sometimes the rude, mean or bigotted comments make social media feel like a necessary evil.
I’m all for people respectfully sharing their opinion, especially when it is different from mine (debates are the root of progress) but jabs at me and my organization and the people we write about, those seem never ending and are hurtful.
When it comes to news it seems like the people that have nothing but bad things to say are the voices that are the loudest. Sometimes it is hard to take a step back and remember these are only a few in the many people that pick up the paper or stop to read a story that I shared online.
Technology has changed the way we communicate so much! Would I be better off getting a letter every six months from my friend instead of being able to see what she is up to and talk to her every day? Or would I feel even more lonely?
There is no way to tell. But right now I’m wishing I could get back to my weekly coffee dates with my one friend and my weekly lunch dates with my other friends, with some baby cuddles and giggles thrown in the mix.
@JDoll_Revy
jocelyn.doll@revelstokereview.com
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