Off the social network

A few months ago, I closed my Facebook account. This happened to fall not too far from the beginning of Lent, and so became related to a Lenten practice of intentional relationships (an experiment that failed utterly, but I'll blog on that later).

I know other people who have left Facebook--some repeatedly--and I usually hear it described as a sort of "breaking free." Like Facebook was a drug, an addiction, and quitting was a wrenching but necessary experience. That's how the story tends to be told, anyway.

For me, leaving Facebook was more like letting an unused gym membership expire. I occasionally posted, seldom read, and never responded to messages. Any question I was asked that began with "Did you see so-and-so's post on Facbeook..." could always be answered in the negative. So closing the account wasn't an accomplishment at all (though I did accept some accolades).

I have said fairly consistently that I think I will eventually re-open my Facebook account, once I figure out how I intend to use it. But in the interim, here are some observations I have made about life off the social network:

On maleficence

In the over a year that I have not really been an active blogger, several topics have made it onto a list of things I really want to blog about. Knowing, however, that my thoughts on these topics are bound to wane in poignance as well as timeliness, I'm going to skip straight to what made me sit down tonight.

I went to see Maleficent tonight, and I have some thoughts.