Sunday, November 29, 2009

Facebook

I admit, posting on a blog is a little too self aware. What starts as an easy way to keep several people abreast of the trivial details of one's life soon becomes an exercise in metaphysics. Like, "I wonder how that will sound on my blog." Or, "I better not do that because someone on my blog will read it." Or, "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention. I was thinking about how I will describe this on my blog."

It's the act of living through the blog and not apart from the blog. It's like, "That didn't happen because it's not on my blog." There is more than one incident that I consider in limbo because it has not yet been posted here and can "only" benefit me. I mean, what's the point?

Now, it would be fair to say old Oggy Bleacher has a bit too much time on his hands already and the perils of the online world don't affect people as much as they affect him. He might even be accused of inventing them to further his mental decline and to have ammunition to indict the imperfect world with. Point taken. But raise your hand if you haven't thought for a moment, "My parents never had this kind of virtual networking and they managed to survive."

So, to put it as timidly as possible, we are the first lizards who are growing wings. We are that fish who flops on the beach and realizes it can breathe. We are the ape who bangs another ape with a bone and then gets laid. Something had to change and in the case of our generation it is the way we communicate. Yes, it is true that we can go to the moon but can't cross the street to meet our neighbors. Why? Because we have other ways to know them. Communication is still power and the old lady across the street (what's her name?) knows almost nothing that google can't tell me. It's nostalgic to be neighborly. I don't know the neighbors down the hall at the halfway house. But when one of them lost the key to a lock they had no choice but knock on my door and ask me for some bolt cutters. Is there a way to google that? I tried it when I lost my toothbrush. Still looking...

So, Facebook is something. I admit it is something. I am more like the fish with weird proto-lungs who is still dubious about getting out of the water. I like it in the mud. But I'm curious about the sand. Is it true you don't die? If a squirrel can wear a scuba bell in Spongebob then I can post on Facebook. My protection is my alibi. Oggy Bleacher.

See, where Kerouac went wrong was using his own name. He was wounded by criticism because he took it personally. Well, what he wrote was very personal so it is kind of putting yourself in harm's way. He could not only be criticized about his style (rambling, verbose, plotless) but his content (aimless, hedonistic, self-absorbed) is a journal of his life. Dharma Bums is a book about his life. It almost has a plot but only because he was totally adrift and sought solace in solitude and friendship. So to examine Kerouac is to criticize the writer and the man. The same could be true for Hemingway and Thomas Wolfe. Steinbeck, on the other hand, skirted the edges of fiction. His two memoirs, Sea of Cortez and Travels With Charley, are pure unaffected journalism. Wolfe and Kerouac were journalists who couldn't get out of their own way...so they turned it into an advantage by writing EVERY DETAIL.

Where was I going with this? Oh, yeah, Oggy Bleacher is not only the character in Memorabilia, but he can give me some distance between my self-absorbed, plotless, existence online, and my self-absorbed plotless existence offline. Well, it hasn't worked yet, but neither am I offended when my posts fail to amuse. I blame Oggy. He's immature. Arrested development. Blah blah.
So look for me on facebook. egotrip@gmail.com. be my friend. mass wolf awareness events are planned.
Creative Commons License
Man in the Van by Oggy Bleacher is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.