Cancer Survivor, writing about Health and Fitness as you age

Dear colleague and Facebook friend-wannabe: " Yes, I did in fact get your friend request. It is sitting in my email inbox while I decide what to do with it. You see, just because we are colleagues, it does not mean that I am interested in your friend's son's birthday nor what you and your partner ate for dinner last night nor where you ate even though I am sure the photos you would share would be very enticing. Frankly, while I am very happy to exchange work pleasantries with you, don't mistake that for being deeply interested in every detail (and I do mean detail) of your life and for me wanting to include you in my social circle of family and close friends. Consider if you will, my 'social capacity index' - my ability to have a meaningful interaction with anyone via social media. It is pretty low, and gets lower with each additional friend. I can barely keep up with my immediate family as it is, far less extended family and close friends....

But first a note about this post -  I've written it in Trini English. I was inspired by a colleague who heard me speaking to someone from Trinidad in the office one day, and said that he didn't know I had an accent. Well at least he didn't say that he didn't know I could speak a whole other language! But on to the post. So when ah firs' decide to get on Facebook, ah figah is only meh family ah go connect to. So ah was tinkin' dat it go be ah few people, no big deal. So ah join and ah start to keep in contac' wid meh mother's side ah de family. Well, ah see meh Dad's side too, so of course ah have to connec' to dem too. But den wat about meh friends? Ah cyah say no to dem neither. And den I see almost meh whole secondary school classmates - wuh ah go do eh? Ah ha to "fren" dem... So now, ah reach up to 93 frens and family. Ah have Mother side, daddy side, meh St. Louis friends, meh Trini friends and classmates, meh Austin friends,...

My family in Trinidad have Facebook accounts, so I decided to get one, to keep in touch. Well, what a time-sucker is all I'll say. It works great for pushing information outward to all your "friends" - a one-liner on your wall and they all see it, but it is very time-consuming when all your friends post something of their own on their walls which you see. I wish I could find a way to see only what my friends post and not the responses of their friends who I don't know! And I'm not even talking about the gifts, invitations and other miscellaneous things my friends send me. On the upside, I've reconnected with school buddies that I haven't spoken to in about 20 years!! I told one of my cousins that he has too much information on his (public) Facebook profile, to which he responded, "..and you have none". Well you see, it's because I have an IT background. I can only too easily imagine worst case scenarios (even my former corporate employer...