On Being... a person on the internet.
number 002
First things first: WE HAVE A NEW PRESIDENT!
Yesterday, as I was texting my mother-in-law about the inauguration, I had an epiphany: I want to live in an America with a President who stutters, an America where the Vice President is a Black and Indian woman whose mother was an immigrant. Where a Black poet, Amanda Gorman, becomes the first National Youth Poet Laureate and manages to perfectly sum up where we are as a nation with her work, and where Garth Brooks breaks stage protocol to jump into Barack Obama’s arms. I know these people aren’t perfect in the slightest. Joe Biden wasn’t my first choice for president. He also wasn’t my second. But I am confident that he will be effective for the day, because if he is nothing else, he is a career politician who is unafraid to communicate through conflict and disagreement. I am hopeful, optimistic, and eager to get to work.
I’m also delighted that we have new big meme energy from King Bernie Sanders.
And now on with the show (the newsletter)…
One of the best and worst parts of my job is that I can do it from my phone. On one hand, the world is my oyster—everything is accessible and if I can dream it, I can probably find it on an Etsy store or watch a Skillshare class to learn how to do it. I can reconnect with a childhood best friend. I can launch an event and sell tickets. I can connect with a brand I’ve loved for years and make money talking about getting ready for SXSW, and then when SXSW gets cancelled I can pivot and talk about how kind they were to me when my whole world shut down due to COVID-19. I can connect with clients in Canada or France and travel to do work (not during COVID, of course).
I can connect with people all over the world, share outfits and inspire fat girls in Toronto or Des Moines or the UK to wear a bra with a blazer or not wear a bra at all. I can impulsively dye my hair blue, regret it, and then have thousands of people shout “yes queen” at me from the comfort of their own living rooms in isolation.
I can also channel my rage and anger over the state of the world into joining groups of like-minded individuals committed to rallying together around the state of Florida during the election, sending out thousands of postcards, making hundreds of calls, and attempting to get just one more person registered to vote before Election Day. And after Election Day picking right back up again in Georgia for the Senate run-off election.
There are many, many positives.
The negatives are likely just as numerous. All of them amount to me cowering on my chaise, un-showered and dissolving into a puddle of anxious goo, almost feral, with a death grip on my phone, on my 8th hour of doom scrolling, crying because I’m convinced no one really likes me because my instagram posts of my work continue to bomb.
But the truth is, I love the internet dearly. It feels, and has always felt, like a friend.
The internet has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. One of my fondest memories of childhood was spending time with my mom’s boss’ daughter, who would let me browse the internet on her orange iMac G3 and take quizzes on J14’s website about what flavor Lip Smacker I’d be or which member of N’Sync I’d marry or what Y2K trend I should try. Nilla Mint Frost, JC and a studded belt, obviously.
I met my now-husband in real life at 16, but he and I became friends and I developed a crush on him in an AIM chat box. He even asked me to be his girlfriend over the chat, and I said no, but that I might change my mind if he’d ask me in person, clearly exhibiting an early mastery of both my understanding of how the internet works AND online dating. I dedicated my life to one and retired early from the other.
Oftentimes, being a millennial on the internet feels like graduating from juggling balls to juggling knives—sure you know how to juggle, but those knives can still cut you if you miscalculate the logistics.
As my anxiety spikes, so does my screen time—or maybe it’s the other way around.
How can I effectively use that knowledge and keep myself engaged where I am, whether that’s online or off? I think for me, that involves showing up fully. When I’m on instagram, I try and engage on accounts that I love and use my time boosting content from accounts that are driving change. When I’m offline, my phone isn’t in my hand, and as often as possible, it’s in a cookie jar in our bedroom. You can buy this expensive one online, or you can snag a vintage cookie or ingredients jar from a thrift store (that’s the route I chose).
Here are few things that have helped me balance my time on the internet and IRL:
Being outside, laying on the ground, doing nothing
Morning pages a la The Artist’s Way
Finding things I’m excited about offline and sharing those things online.
Planoly to pre-write and schedule Instagram posts
Reading and listening to audiobooks
Beading mask chains and necklaces.
Here’s where my head is this week:
Reading: Be Here Now by Ram Dass and going to pick up Chaos: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties by Charles O’ Neil from my library soon.
Writing: about politics, the internet and so many podcast pitches.
Listening: to Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener, Pod Save Americaand the focus playlists on Headspace. The new Camp Trash single “Bobby”.
Watching: Search Party (thanks for the rec Keegan and Raquel) and The Mandalorian.
Buying: I’m supposed to be on a spending freeze, but I definitely impulse bought this Article couch because I found it for a steal on Facebook marketplace.I also bought this Inauguration print from Lisa Congdon.
Focusing on: rest and trying to figure out what works for me.
WOW! You’ve made it this far! Thank you for supporting me by subscribing to this newsletter and sharing it with your friends. It means the world to me that you’d continue to invite me in to your internet living room.
If you like what you see here and want to continue the support you can do one or more of the following: forward this email to a few friends who would dig it, follow me on Instagram and share my work there, follow the publication I co-founded with the imitable Beth Hitchcock, or buy me a coffee.