Back around 2010 and 2011, my life and career fell apart. I’d lost my job and become a stay-at-home dad, taking care of a toddler son while trying also to earn a few bucks churning out a blog post or two for a tech site — a gig I wasn’t really qualified for, but I knew how to write. My health was on the verge of failing. It felt like nothing good could happen again.
And then my baby got sick.
Stuck at home. No car. Wife at work in the suburbs of Philadelphia. The child too ill to try and shove into a stroller and run to get the Pedialyte he desperately needed. I didn’t know what to do.
So I put out a cry for help on Twitter.
A Twitter friend, Tim Carmody, saw my plea. He amplified it. A writer, Andi Buchanan, saw it and delivered the necessary electrolites. We were saved.
In fact, Twitter — well, Twitter and Facebook — saved me a lot there for a couple of years. When I got sick and spent a year in and out of the hospital, in and out of surgery, Facebook was where I could post and receive good wishes from friends across the country while isolated in a hot, stuffy hospital room, delirious from pain and meds. It made me feel less alone. And Twitter was where I met other Philadelphia freelance writers and started to rebuild my career and life.
When we moved from Philadelphia back to Kansas, it didn’t matter on Twitter. I kept friendships, still had my professional connections. They didn’t suddenly disappear. I didn’t have to remake my network like you often do when you move cross-country.
Facebook, I abandoned years ago. I tried the same with Twitter a couple of times, when it felt like it was colonizing my mind to the exclusion of everything else. I finally made my peace with it, more or less: I’d still overpost and overshare, but also learn incredible amounts. And every couple of weeks, I’d delete my account for a day or two to get a reset, to read real books or pay attention to my family without distraction.
And yeah, I got a few jobs on Twitter, too.
Now, maybe Twitter is over. We’ll see. Part of me thinks I’ll be better off without it. Part of me thinks maybe I’ll never have the fun I’ve had with smart people and their smart comments ever again. And all of me knows that if it does disappear, it will be impossible to rebuilt the networks I’ve built over the last dozen years.
It’ll all be gone. I’m not sure what that’ll mean for me personally. I don’t really want to find out. I don’t want to have to be alone in my head.
Everything passes. But you know what? It’s always a little sad when it does.
As you know, I recently left Twitter after months of resistance. We come from different political perspectives -- though they seem to be getting closer -- and the MAGA toxicity on Twitter led me to aggressively block and mute dozens of accounts (some from friends) for my own well-being. Twitter became more like an RSS feed, but one I couldn’t completely curate. It was less a social network than a one-way channel. And the programs suck. Now that even modest vetting of accounts is vanishing, I can’t handle Twitter.
Unlike you, I’ve stuck with Facebook. It’s easier to curate, and for me, it’s a place to be social instead of political.
Of course, I’ve also retired from writing, so the professional networks aren’t as important. I understand the need to keep those lines open.
Maybe chatting on Substack threads will keep me engaged!