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Cheryl's Room

I click the status box on Facebook and it asks me that question. I look forward to learning what is on my friends’ minds as part of keeping in touch with friends across the world, some of whom I have only met electronically. I want to know what they are doing, what events are happening in their lives, indeed, what’s on their mind. But in the past year I have seen a rapid decline in the number of posts that give me any information about the poster. Instead my wall is filled with cartoons, pictures, videos, and commentary that was shared from someone else’s wall and was probably not original to that wall either. Often I see the same cartoons multiple times. Sometimes I see hoaxes that have been circulating for years. And the worst are shared items that attempt to guilt me into liking or sharing, because if I scroll it means that I don’t like my mother, or God, that I don’t support our military, that I am a bonafide schmuck.

From these posts I learn about the causes my friends support, but I don’t learn anything about them. No longer do I know what’s going on in their lives, what’s on their mind. And I miss that.

Sharing has become effortless; I can even share others’ content from my iPad or iPhone, and I have shared myself when a cartoon or link captures exactly what was on my mind.

In an episode of Bones, Dr. Brennan meets her second cousin Margaret (played by her real-life sister) who carries around a small volume of Benjamin Franklin’s sayings and responds to every question with an aptly chosen saying. At first, Dr. Brennan challenges whether Ben Franklin is the smartest man in the world as her cousin believes, or questions whether the sayings are true, but finally she responds with “I’d rather hear what you have to say than Benjamin Franklin,” and Margaret tells her that that is the nicest thing that anyone has ever said to her. I’d rather hear what my friends have to say than something they discovered and passed on. Like Facebook, I want to know what’s on their mind.

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One Response to “What’s on Your Mind?”

  • Carey wrote:

    This is great. I love to look at Facebook and see the progress of my “friends” lives, but I really look forward to THEIR comments not so much their sharing. The “keep on scrolling” placards are the worse, and I refuse to be manipulated by them. Thanks for your insights.

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Quote of the Moment:

“The easiest way to solve a problem is to deny it exists.”
by Isaac Asimov