everyone on instagram reminds me of someone i hate
i am still thinking about that euphoria finale. specifically, i think about fez telling lexi that social media takes the fun out of getting to know someone. i guess it is a tired concept that the content we post for the heart-shaped applause is simply our highlight reel. well according to fez, they are our scraps.
i’ve been fixated on this. scraps. i look at my own pictures. in my head i’m putting my best foot forward, even when i’m trying to be casual. i think, ‘is that not what i’m actually doing?’ and then ‘how could i ever think i was doing anything else?’
i’ll come across an instagram or twitter profile any of ways that these apps design for us to find each other . i’ll look at a few of the profiles. ‘what’s their vibe?’ i’ll ask. ‘do they seem nice? do they seem similar to me? any red flags?’ how could there be red flags when people are only uploading our greats hits? but somehow there are, and i find every one of them.
i see a person use an emoji that reminds me of the way a friend’s ex-something used to type. gross.
another person is excited about a concert by an artist i would otherwise be pretty lukewarm about. but a person i went to high school with who i absolutely despised posted about that same concert. (i know this, of course, bc i follow them too.) scoff. eye roll. scroll.
are we keeping an eye out for red flags in people's posts? or are we actively looking for them? are we actively looking for them or are we creating them where there are none?
what parts of my own image are other people hyperfixating on and hating?
there’s this thing we associate with caricatures of bitter, grumpy old people. they project their decades of baggage onto every word and situation they’re presented with, even when the circumstance has nothing to do with that. is that us now? are we just expediting the process of our own grumpiness by the sheer inundation of profiles?
at this point, i know i’m my worst self when i open the apps. we’re so positive that we’re better than each other, that we know better, that the smallest difference might potentially threaten the entire image of the lives we’ve built in our heads.
i don’t believe that romance can die. it’s part of who we are. real connection exists in our psyches, so it will find a way to exist in our social habits. but just as chemistry and spark are innate to us, so is our ability to get in our own way. against our best interest, people have been accidentally inventing social roadblocks for centuries. like the way we ask people, “how are you?” but know it effectively communicates nothing. or the way we’ve decided there’s an appropriate set of topics to discuss at the dinner table.
there was a time i found it so cringe when someone posted an old ass, long-expired meme. now i’m envious, like you really don’t come on here. tell me how. tell me how you stop yourself from performing, stop yourself from needing even a little bit of attention, stop yourself from feeling like the world will forget who you are if you don’t remind them one more time?
i post and post and post because at this point i don’t know how not to, and in doing so, i actively invite eyes to look and stare and form opinions and pick it all the fuck apart. i let other people, often strangers, participate in the creation of my self. and after all that, i’m still shocked to find all that’s left to see is scraps.