Not Quite Quitting Facebook

I stay off facebook because I learned years ago that it makes me all judgy and I'm so uncomfortable being judgy that I'll do things to avoid it like delete my online dating profile after a week and refrain from seventh grade sleep overs (when in seventh grade) and almost but not quite quit facebook.

Not quite quitting facebook means that sometimes a friend will tag a photo of me and I'll hop on to check it out or I'll write out my once a year post on the wall of someone who I share a bonded anniversary with but don't keep in touch with on many other days and that is fine. It's all fine. But not quite quitting facebook also means that on rare occasions I find myself getting lost down the rabbit hole of past friends and classmates and people who came into my life for a reason or a season but certainly not a lifetime. And these days those people are quite certainly getting married or buying houses or in my most recent findings, having babies. Which is fine. It's all fine. Except that sometimes this news, although expected, is a little jarring because is it really possible to have a life that perfect?! A life that looks like the front cover of an L.L.Bean catalog with, oh who knows, maybe a fire place or perfect Christmas tree with chickadee ornaments or matching blue sweaters and brown boots and a black lab and a canoe tipped over in the back yard just waiting for spring?*

And of course, I still go off into an absurd rant about life decisions and love decisions and nursery wall paper and pottery barn collections and all the things said and all the things not said and houses in the woods and clearing snow off the roof; and really it's not all that absurd other than the fact that I'm ranting about it. And the ranting comes with pacing and leaving rooms and entering rooms and talking in paragraphs and pages without taking a breath and declaring that I'm going for a walk in the rain.

"You can have all that, you know," she says. I have to stop and pause, because very sincerely, I don't want all of that. I might someday, but I haven't yet and I don't now. If it exists, that catalog cover life, which it might, it's not the cover I want right now. I know this; I remember that I know this; and immediately it's as though I've taken a deep breath. Every muscle relaxes. My words fall quiet.

I'm still fuming a bit though, as the smoke rises and clears, over things said too long ago. I'd still like to take a walk in the rain. Like years ago, I'd like to walk down the street face up to the clouds, letting the rain replace tears because I'm too angry to cry over some one else's choices and what I know to be true. I've let myself down though. Ranting about the same things I ranted about years ago - nursery wall paper, houses in the woods, L.L.Bean shoes - when it was all too long ago, years ago. I'm not angry any more. What was once true may be no longer. I've let go, long ago, of any reason to get worked up.

So it becomes silly, I suppose. I should feel silly, I guess. Ranting like a mad woman about life choices and love choices. But it has been a while since I got that worked up, and suddenly, I'm relieved. I still have it. That spark. That fight. For what it is I want for my life, for myself. For what it is I believe. I'm still willing to fight for what I know to be true.

It had been a while. Too long, really. But it's still there. Thank goodness, it's still there.

[*I'm from New England, so "perfect" looks a lot like L.L.Bean covers. And I mixed up the seasons and descriptors because I'm from New England and it's kind of a small place. Just sayin'.]