Just Hilarie

I’m almost finished with a collection of stories by Alice Munro. They – or at least those people who take it upon themselves to decide these things – describe her as a writer of short stories but I think they are wrong. The words on the page, collected under one title, may not be many but the stories are not short. They are just a piece of a much larger whole. It is as though she has baked a large, entire cake or pie, but she keeps her baked goods back in the kitchen, only just cutting you a thin slice and laying it out for you in the dining room. Just that slice from the larger cake. Her stories are just slices of entire novels and after you have finished reading them you come away knowing everything about the people in the stories – their entire lives described in just one slice. I can understand why she won the Nobel prize – to be able to write like that!

I usually choose to read science fiction – novels about other places, often in outer space, on other planets, sometimes even on our own planet. But no matter what the setting or even the species being written about, the stories are actually about the human condition, if they are any good that is. Alice Monro writes science fiction (though perhaps without the science part). I usually sit on the subway, on my way to work when I read and that is where I’ve been reading most of this particular book. As I approach my subway stop, I turn down the corner of the page to save my place. I stuff the book back in my carryall and then I look up. For a moment, I don’t know where I am. It takes me awhile to orient myself back to the Universitet subway station, to the opening car doors, to the mass of people standing up and exiting the train. Because I have been up till that point, far away, inhabiting one of the small worlds of Alice Monro’s creation and it takes me some time to come back to my own world.

“If you forget where you left your keys that’s one thing, but if you forget what a key is for and how to use it, that’s another thing”

I went down to my office this morning, the cellar space we rent next door to our apartment building. In the elevator on the way down, I met one of my neighbors. Like me, she comes from another country and like me, she likes to talk so the ride down was spent in a lot of animated catching-up chatter and laughter. Arriving at the ground floor, we went our separate ways and I continued on to my office door. I quickly unlocked the first door but when it came to the second door, I found myself trying to put my apartment door key into the lock. Now, please understand, the keys look completely different so it wasn’t a case of mistaken identity. It took me a second or two but then I chose the correct key from my key ring, opened the door and went in. But just those few seconds of hesitation when I got to the door, realized the key wasn’t working and I needed another key, was enough to get me worried. Is this the beginning?

My husband’s mother had alzheimers – by the end of her life she no longer could recognize anyone, not even herself and hadn’t a clue where she was. In my family, my grandmother, my father and my mother were all still-sharpened pencils at the end of their lives. Maybe the points were a bit dulled, not quite as sharp as they once were, but still very capable of writing. So I’m hoping I’ve inherited that from them. But still, I worry.

Just those few seconds when I stared at the door, the key in my hand and didn’t quite know why I wasn’t getting in and what should I do about it, was enough to make me wonder – am I starting to lose it? Is this how it begins – in tiny little moments?

I once had a discussion about memory, way-back-when in New York City with my New York shrink. She told me that you remember the things, events, etc which, as they are happening, you are truly involved with at the time they are happening. In other words if you are walking to the bus stop but are thinking of what you will be making for dinner you probably won’t remember the walk to the bus or what you saw on the way. And if you are in the grocery store to buy dinner but are still thinking about the conversation you had with your neighbor on the way to the bus stop, you will walk up to the meat section, look at it and have no idea why you are there. Now that kind of thing happens to me a lot. And I know I’m not alone in that. It also happens to my son and he is only 22 so I don’t think it has anything to do with age or Alzheimer’s. I guess it has more to do with paying attention. A friend of mine, a born and bred, true, native New Yorker, who in all her almost 70 years has never had a drivers license, once told me she probably would be a terrible driver because her mind wanders. Now this woman is a real sharp cookie so its not like she is getting dim. But her mind wanders. And I guess that’s the thing I’m getting at – because my mind wanders too. I’m not saying its a bad thing either. Because no matter how far afield I wander off, I always come back to where I am. And I still remember how to unlock the door.

Hi… my name is Hilarie… and…  I’m an addict.

Maybe not the usual kind though. I rarely drink. I don’t take drugs, unless I’m sick. Being a pessimist, I know I’ll never win so I don’t gamble either.

No…my addiction is to Facebook.

In 2009, a friend of mine talked me into joining. I had heard of it. It was something youngsters were doing. I’m not really a joiner kind of person and didn’t see the point but I joined. It didn’t take very long and I was hooked.

These days, I usually check my Facebook page first thing in the morning before getting ready for work – reading all the updates that came in during the night.

The first thing I do when I come home in the evening, before I start my routine of making dinner, is to check Facebook.

But, like an alcoholic who feels he’s got his drinking under control because he doesn’t drink at work, I don’t check my News Feed during the day at my job. Okay, Okay! I do once in a while. Stop bugging me.

I absolutely don’t check it while riding home on the subway though. (That might be due more to the fact that I still have a dumb phone and can’t get the Internet on it.)

I’m not in denial – I openly admit it – I’m addicted. I can spend my whole evening constantly returning to my computer to see what new updates have come in.

I am most definitely not a Lurker – you know – the kind of Facebooker who secretly reads but never posts – the quiet ones. Well, I am not quiet. I post frequently – sharing with my Friends what I am doing at the moment, describing something I had seen earlier in the day or just spouting off about something that bugged me. Occaisionally, I will even put up a photo. Sometimes I share what others have to say, perhaps an article from the New York Times or some other website or even occasionally re-share what some FB friend posted on their own wall. But whenever I share something, I always say why I’m sharing it – my thoughts about it. I also want to make clear that I do read most of what my FB friends write when they write something in their own words. And I respond to what they say – adding my own thoughts and ideas – as though it were a conversation.  I don’t just press the LIKE button. I’m actually still undecided what the LIKE button means. Does it just mean that you’ve read the post? Does it always mean that you like and agree with the post? The LIKE button is too vague for me. While I am very happy to read others posting their own thoughts and words in my News Feed, I don’t copy other people’s words on to my page as my own post. I have my own words to use.

There are some things on Facebook that I don’t do and I mean DON’T with capital letters:
I DON’T poke people – ever! If you poke me I won’t poke you back. I probably won’t even notice your poke.

I also DON’T play Facebook Games and steadfastly ignore all attempts by friends to get me to play with them. So if you are interested in playing FB Games, do it with someone else and don’t bother me.

And the last of my DON’TS is that I don’t post photos of stranger’s cats, or some unknown person’s funny dogs or missing children pictures or picture after picture after picture of funny/uplifting/political text or quote –  graphically arranged with an illustration. When Friends post that kind of thing (without even any personal comment) I admit that I can often find them amusing, even very funny but when it becomes an entire flood of one after the other its a bit numbing and boring. It becomes totally impersonal and even stalkerish. Moderation should be the key word here. But, I like the personal.  Photos of my FB Friend’s own cats, dogs, children, miscelleneous relatives, food, baked goods and vacation trips are always welcome and I enjoy viewing them. (I also have to admit that I also like recipes.)

I sometimes have discussions with friends about Facebook in real life (IRL!). Some of these people are also my virtual FB Friends and others are not even on it at all.  Some say that they don’t post because they want to keep their lives private and I can respect that. Others say they haven’t joined because they don’t have room in their already busy, stressed lives for one more thing and I can respect that too. And finally, some say that they are just too shy to post and don’t know what to say. I guess I also have to accept that reason too but I must admit that I don’t really understand it.

I think one of the great things about being human is the ability to share who we are with other human beings. This is partially the reason I started this blog and certainly the reason I like Facebook. And its not just about me telling others what I am doing/thinking/feeling. I like reading about what other people are doing in their lives too. It makes me feel connected to those people. I like that I can decide to bake something, announce it on Facebook and hear back from my FB network about it. I get comments on how my baking looks, other recipe suggestions and virtual offers to come over and sample the results. It’s as though I have my friends with me while I’m baking. I also like making witty comments to someone’s post and if they are still online, getting some sort of snappy conversation going – a back and forth reparté. For me, Facebook is like a large, cross-borders, world-wide, 24-hour cocktail party. I can mingle freely with whoever is nearby (meaning online just then) sharing thoughts, ideas, opinions, and clever quips. I can be funny, supportive, consoling, congratulating  or quiet – all at the same time! But the best part is that I don’t have to put on my makeup or worry about what dress to wear, or did I have too much to drink or how am I going to get home, and if there will be a parking space in front of my building. I’m already home. And the party is always there, waiting for me, whenever I want to be there.

Okay, just let me see who’s online now. Has anyone responded to my last post? Gotta go.

I am standing outside on the deck this early September night. Except for a bit of glow from our livingroom windows, I am surrounded by the dark. As far from the windows as possible, I lean against the railing and look up. My view of the night sky is cordoned off by the ring of trees surrounding our property. Just above the roof line, I see the  Big Dipper – it is so clear and bright and obvious against the background of all the other stars. I don’t remember it being so bright when I was a kid growing up in Budd Lake, New Jersey. Or so huge, either. Does it have something to do with the latitude at which I live now? I follow the short edge of the “cup” till  it leads my eye to the North Star. Considering how important this star has been, leading human beings on journeys of exploration, it isn’t a particularly impressive star – rather a bit dim actually. But all it has to do is what it does, remaining there, directly above my head while all its brothers and sisters rotate round it. I turn my head a bit and I can see a milky path spreading itself across my bowl of sky. The air is so clear and cloudless that this Milky Way is very, very evident. I imagine ancient peoples sitting outside their tents at night, unhindered by light pollution, looking up and seeing all those stars, being surrounded by them, so seemingly close one could just reach out a hand and touch them.

As I stand there on my inconsequential deck, looking up at all those stars scattered against the darkness, I can’t help but be reminded of the many science fiction novels I’ve read whose stories play out against the vast background of Space. And standing there, I think, How parochial we humans are. Tied so closely to this tiny rock we call Earth, in this small neighborhood of the galaxy, upon which all our lives depend. And all we’ve taken are very tiny baby steps outward towards the great unknown.