Social Media FOMO

This week, a certain amount of social media FOMO has crept back in to my life. Getting to spend face to face time with two of my best friends, knowing that they will imminently be leaving for far-flung lands, makes me wish not only that they’d say, but also that I could see more more photos of them and to partake in some of the mundanity of their lives in tweet form. I tell myself that by not being on social media, it forces me to make an effort to have more meaningful interactions with them instead, but sometimes I’m exhausted or busy and just want to check in with them rather than speak on FaceTime or pen a letter.

Of my five closest friends, only one lives in Guernsey, and the other four live multiple plane journeys away. On one hand, I’m grateful that the marvels of modern technology allows me to communicate regularly with them at all, but on the other, it’s tough, and I miss them all dearly.

I don’t really know what the solution is though, as I’m hardly going to be able to persuade any of them to join Mastodon or some other federated platform. I can’t bring myself to rejoin FB/IG/Twitter, in part because I think their practices are deplorable and in part because I’m worried they’d become an unmanageable timesink for me. Either way, I’m going to keep making any extra effort I can - they’re all more than worth it.