When we were young, not exactly little, but definitely not grown, some in-between, maybe high school, maybe I’m misremembering, Evie and I invent a game we call Look At Me. We play this game in a large group, like a party, or a restaurant (Chilis) full of strangers. One of us picks a victim across the room and the other nods in agreement. We contort our faces into heinous masks, basically as ugly as we can muster, our muscles scrunched and our brows furrowed and our eyes emblazoned upon our subject. Game, set, match. We proceed to chant rapidly, in unison, under our breath, until the words run together and barely make sense: lookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatme.
The game concludes with eye contact - either when we are noticed by our prey, or when we look at each other and dissolve into hyena laughs. I can’t remember when we stopped playing, or if we ever really did.
I hear our voices each time I craft a story or post: lookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatmelookatme. I hate how cynical this makes me sound, go back, underline, I really hate how cynical this makes me sound. So I want to write about it, not really fully formed arguments or ideas but just a starting point examine my disconnect with my online self.
Some questions I’ll continue to explore (these are questions for myself, technically, but I would literally luvvvvvvv if you send me your answers):
What does it mean to exist without being seen?
Who is looking, anyway?
Who do I want to be seen by?
And how is it exactly, do I want them to see me?
Is connection the starting point or the end goal?
Perception? Deception?
Should I watch The Circle? I think I will.
Is this (gestures, THIS) about time (and its finitude)?
Or about selfhood?
I hate the word, “selfhood,” but what I really mean is that I suspect that I constantly crave that perceived version of me, the kelseypizza, the one who _______________________.
So, what would it be like if I just…….didn’t for a while?
I delete Instagram from my phone. This is a cycle. Sometimes I say that I’ll delete the social media app from my phone for a month, but keep it deleted for two months. Sometimes I say that I’ll delete the social media app for a month, but re-download it an hour later. This time, I have no intentions or goals. But this is a fissure I want to recognize and pay attention to.
I can’t determine whether I hate the time I spend scrolling and scrolling, or if I feel depleted when searching for connection, responding to stories that are essentially PSAs and not personal to me.
I want to send postcards to my friends. I want to surprise someone with actual mail. The time I take to fire off a response to a story is negligent, and the effect is as well. Let 2023 be the year of the intimate - the personal - the actuality. The absolute HYPOCRISY for a writer to memorialize Being Offline - I’m still here, online, writing to you, over email, on our internets. Whatever.
I’m also texting my delivery driver who is bringing a treasured pizza from my favorite. spot. I canceled plans tonight and I miss my friends but I’m happy to be home awaiting hot pizza. I will bake a three-tier birthday cake this week and it will probably be ugly, and maybe it will even fall over. Isn’t that what it’s about? Trying to get it right, sometimes failing? Loving each other? Listening to John Mayer? On repeat??
