I’m feeling kinda goofy this week. It could be the ever-present caffeine or the full 8 hours of sleep I am getting each night or the 10,000 steps I keep taking each day, but I think it’s actually the fact that I have been Facebook free for 72 hours.
Yes, for the last week of July, I decided to stop Facebooking completely. I actually started weaning myself off it 2 weeks ago, but by Saturday, I was fed up with some of the ridiculous comments on posts and I said “enough!”
Okay, okay, really it was because I started to realize just how much time I was spending on the Book. Whenever I had to work on something that wasn’t exciting, I logged on to FB and read and read and read. And when my friends weren’t posting updates or sharing memes fast enough, I would get antsy. As a result, I wasn’t getting stuff done.
So I went cold turkey…and it hurt. Sunday I was convinced nobody loved me, Monday I was sure no one even liked me. I’ll be honest. I shed more than a few tears of self-doubt in the first 48 hours.
But at the same time, I was discovering something else: All the ideas I wanted to share on FB could be shared elsewhere—on other social media sites, on my blog, on Patreon (I scheduled a lot of posts there!), and even on other writing/publication sites. Instead of wasting my time, energy, and creativity on FB, I was invigorated to share my writing and ideas in other public forums, places that might get more eyes on my creative writing.
I’m still moving slowly in these other realms. I don’t want to jump head first into five different arenas and not be able to keep up. I am working on one outlet at a time. As I feel more confident that I can maintain the pace I am setting, I move on to the next outlet. Soon…world domination!!! (okay, that is definitely the caffeine talking)
This week’s prompt from Charli Mills at the Carrot Ranch is: In 99 words (no more, no less) write a story that features a pie.
That’s Amore
He squinted at the green digital numbers. 350? His stomach growled. He cranked the stove up to 500. His arthritis wasn’t bad today. He could probably work the extinguisher. Where was it? He shrugged.
Two cups flour, half cup water. Mix, mix, mix. What was he forgetting? Salt! A healthy tablespoon full. He spread the dough on the baking sheet.
No tomato sauce. Damn. Ketchup it is. Shame his stomach didn’t do dairy no more. What about vegetables? He found six-year-old parsley buried in the cupboard. That would do. Pizza pie á la Milton.
God he missed his wife.
Yum, yuck. I used to have a theory that there is no bad pizza. I am revising that thinking.
Yes! I have the power to change minds!!! Mwahaha 😉
Actually I think I turned myself off pizza for a while with this story…
I could so relate with your post here! When I think of the time wasted on the trivialities of Facebook, I get panicky. I don’t think anyone ever clicks on my links to my blog when I do bother to post them there. I feel the same about Twitter. I applaud you for your fortitude! Thanks, too, for the suggestions above. I just saw mention of Patreon in a message from Charli earlier this week. I am going to check that out. I enjoy your writing.
I know some creative types have had major successes in promoting their content on FB, but I do not fall within those ranks. (I think for me, it’s a content issue.) But I’ve been enjoying Patreon if only because it holds me accountable. If I am going to ask for support, I darn well better be producing! Thanks for reading~
This has a heart-breaking simplicity that I loved. Made me think of my husband’s lack of acumen in the kitchen. He would have survived on delivery and DiGiorno’s, had he been the one to outlive me. I think of him whenever I cook macaroni–his cheese paste results from my one attempt to ask him to make dinner. I about died laughing eating it.
One of my favorite memories from serving in the Peace Corps was when another volunteer asked how to make grilled cheese (her host family had gotten her some ever-elusive cheese for her birthday and she wanted an American “classic”). So I said butter the bread and fry it (with the cheese inside like a sandwich, which she understood). About 10 minutes later, the tiny kitchen was filled with smoke. She had buttered the inside of the bread and “fried” the (dry outside) sandwich until it burned. I felt horrible, but I still can’t help laughing, 20+ years later.
This story resonates deeply with me as it obviously does with those above. Encompassing loss, poverty, hope, and maybe mental illness or aging population issues in a new and off beat way, I was taken from the first line. Keep it up, C Jai!
Now you understand all my weird texts yesterday about dough-ish stuff. 😉
Some hungers never go away. I had to laugh though, at his practicality of thinking where the fire extinguisher was and if he had the ability to use it. You are doing amazing feats this month, good habits — write, sleep, walk, escape the FB vortex. I know when I’ve been scrolling too long I feel like this character about to eat an unsavory pizza pie.
You really don’t think a salty ketchup pizza on a burnt cracker crust is savory? 😉
A fun piece, but definitely not tasty. I’ll go home for my supper thanks. 🙂
Hahaha — yeah, I haven’t been able to eat anything with ketchup since working on this piece.
A good way to lose weight. If you wanted to! 🙂
haha actually it just means I eat a lot of Asian-inspired foods 😉