September 13, 2007

The tyranny of the web

I used to be able to rise with a joyful list in my heart or hand and, after sufficient coffee, start to take bites out of that list, but now I am waylaid. If I so much as open my email I am bombarded by needs.

I must send a certain saccharine message to no less than 20 people or my roof will leak, my hair fall out and most prolifically I WILL NOT BE RICH!!!

Since that is the case, I must have angered the email gods even before I knew they existed. They have so many needs, it is impossible to appease them all.

And even as I attempt to decide to forward or delete, to which friends or pseudo-friends will I send the dreaded message, I am assailed and distracted by messages popping up and bouncing with an urgency that really can’t merely mean Amazon has mailed out a real book . . . or can it?

I love my email and the quick, swift kicks it allows me to give writers, or loving pokes to friends who have trouble getting off phone lines, but it beckons me like a shiny object. I glimpse it constantly out of the corner of my eye. I am particularly distractable, but I believe I am not alone in the tug exerted by electronic mail.

Finally, I get hold of a way to answer mail, and I know it has to be looked at AFTER I write, then it seems new distractions appear every day.

And each is U R G E N T

Now there is LINKED IN. It seems as if I get about five of these daily It feels as if if I have to sign all these year books for folks I worked with in theater, or magazines or Wall Street or went to High School with. And if I don’t, it is insulting or I look as if I have no proper skills in the land of cyber space; when really I want to not add extra shit to an already tippy pile.

I know where to find the people I need. I meet new ones every week, and I keep the info on those that interest me.

Do I really want to be a part of a myriad of social networks?

More importantly, why at my age, am I still trying to please people, pathetically even virtual people?