The constant barrage of soapboxing on social media is exhausting. Faces facing me, wagging their fingers or wiping away tears, some whispering, some whining and several shouting are all telling me what I should think or be afraid of, or angry about or telling me with smiling faces and hands over hearts and sometimes quavering voices that our joy is a weapon against the big awful. Many sound like they are trying to convince themselves. They sound like they need to believe in something and are reaching out to others to help hold themselves up. They are all speaking their truths to power and I appreciate their passion and the desire to stand up for what is right but by the end of the day, after seeing the same reel a dozen times on several people’s posts, I feel wrung out. Today I kept thinking of Max Headroom glitching and twitching on a screen. My brain and my heart can’t take it anymore.

I hear people telling me it’s okay to step away and take care of myself and to breathe . I’m glad people are trying to look out for themselves and each other in that way. That’s where I am headed. Instagram won’t let me deactivate for another day. I am weak. I keep checking in –just one last time. Ugh. Tomorrow or Monday morning perhaps, Instagram will allow me to deactivate for the gazillionth time this year and I will cut the imaginary tether and put my phone in a drawer for several hours a day and stay away from social media for an entire season (or two) and and do my best to figure out how to extricate myself from the matrix and reset my internal clock and restore the natural rhythms of my brain by separating myself from the crazy, racing clock that is the endless noisy scroll of Instagram and live my life slowly and quietly for a while. I wonder if the world will start to look different?

Sigh.