Social Networking

I finally did it.

I broke out of the pack and terminated my account with a popular social networking site. I was tired of constantly worrying about my privacy being compromised, my identity put at risk, my information being sold to third parties, and so on. The day after I terminated my account, the president of the site made a public apology about privacy issues. I like to think I prompted that crisis of conscience but, in all likelihood, it wasn't just my account being closed that pushed him over the edge.

I originally opened the account to try to connect with folks that I hadn't seen in years, and I did hear from a few. But I had to wade through 500 other posts, inviting me to join their causes, feed their animals, hunt for eggs and help them locate the home for a lost cow, just to try to find a post from my neighbor who moved away 15 years ago. Didn't I have her e-mail address, anyway?

I remember a time, not so very many years ago (OK about 40+ years, but who's counting?) that we didn't have all this instant contact. In fact, I remember when I lived with my grandmother in the north Georgia mountains, and she didn't even have a private phone line. My cousins and I loved to sneak into the living room and quietly pick up the receiver, knowing that it was likely that a couple of the neighbors would be on the party line. Hours of fun. (We didn't really know what eavesdropping was, although we did have an inkling that it wasn't right or we wouldn't have had to sneak in to listen). Oh, but the information we gleaned - we heard the lurid details of Mrs. So-and-so's gallbladder surgery and we heard the benefits touted of a new miracle product that one lady had finally persuaded herself to try: spray starch. It was educational.

Sunday afternoons at Grandma's were spent visiting. The extended family would be there after church, and you never knew who else might stop by, "just to set a spell." Friends, neighbors, other family members who lived a greater distance away - there was always company. On the 2nd and 4th Sundays, when the church had a preacher (usually a layperson who would make the drive from Atlanta), you could count on him dropping in. Everyone sat up a little straighter and talked reverently about the Lord and frowned on the sorry state of our sinful world while he was there, then relaxed and went back to being themselves after he left.

In the winter, everyone would be crowded into the house, because the only heat in the place came from the wood stove in the living room; in the summer, the front porch was filled to overflowing. The older folks sat in the chairs or on the porch swing and the younger, more able-bodied, sat on the floor, leaning against the posts. We kids alternated between listening to the odd bits of conversation that interested us, and playing tag or climbing the big June apple tree.

In the summer the subject inevitably arose as to when each family was planning to cut and bale hay. They worked out an informal schedule so that each could help the other with that task. In the fall, they spoke of the coming frost and coordinated their hog-killin' days - another big job that was more easily accomplished with the help of a neighbor or two (and, boy, was I grateful for those neighbors - I didn't relish having to carry raw meat in my bare hands from the smokehouse to the kitchen).

That was the reality of farm life - if someone's cow got lost, the neighbor brought it back (and helped to mend the fence where it had escaped). If someone was seriously ill, or "down in the back," another pitched in to milk the cows and gather the eggs. You helped each other with the hard work and brought a covered dish when someone died and on Sundays you visited your neighbor. All face-to-face, up close and personal.

Now that's what I call social networking.