I’ve been off Facebook for a while now, and to be honest, I don’t miss it. I wrote a post a couple of years ago explaining why, and my stance hasn’t much changed since then. If anything, it’s gotten worse, with news of them curating their feeds, selecting what I can see or their insane charges for visibility, and injecting a political agenda into their operations.

I also know that Facebook is actually good for keeping in touch. It makes it easy, and when I did have an account I got friend requests from people I hadn’t seen in decades, including friends in Sweden! My piano teacher from when I was a kid, high school friends, it was nice.

There was a lot of nonsense drama, of course, and I do not approve of drama, but I suppose that’s par for the course; it happens in real life too. I can’t fault people for being people. Not too much, anyway.

Still, I kept away with only the occasional thought that it would be nice to be in better touch with people. Then, I received an email from my closest, dearest friend, who I visit every year towards the end of October. He said he was distressed by the fact that as I begin the voyage back home, we always enthusiastically say “we’ll keep in touch!” And while we say it with good intentions, and well-meaning, and do keep to the pledge for the first few months, life and time gets in the way and it always trails off and we go months without communicating. So he asked me to get back on Facebook.

I don’t like that Facebook is so dominating as a means of communication, but it is easy. I remember almost missing a concert because a group of friends arranged the whole thing on Facebook and because I wasn’t on it I didn’t hear about it. One of them contacted me via text to tell me and I ended up seeing the show after all, but I fear a societal reliance on it that makes it hard to oppose. Although our friendship has lasted for over twenty years, like him I have worried about it becoming more distance because of the distance, and my distaste for Facebook can be overcome to ensure the friendship continues. It’s an issue of priorities and between the two, Facebook doesn’t even register.

Also, while I’m not certain, I believe logging in will restore my account to where it was before, whatever that means. We’ll see.

Oh, one other thing: I haven’t done it yet. I told him I will but I need to rev up for it. This isn’t something to be undertaken lightly!