Status Anxiety

Yeah, I’m on the Facebook.  I resisted for some time, but being able to play Scrabble (or, more accurately, “Scrabulous”) with friends ultimately got me.  I’ve developed a bond with the husband of a college friend of my sister-in-law, forged initially through comments on the baby blogosphere, but secured ultimately through online word games played on Facebook.  We’ve met only twice.  The first time was before our online friendship blossomed.  The second was at a party a few weeks ago.  We were both a little nervous, but happy to see each other.  I joked that we met on “Bromatch.com.”  We haven’t played a game in a while, and I just heard from my sister in-law last week that he misses me.  Scrabulous challenge forthcoming….

Apart from Facebook’s support for connectedness and competitive word twisting, the site allows users to issue  “status” updates whenever they want.  This is a delicate but  powerful art form.  I’ve encountered the following kinds of updates:

Literal: “Luke is working on a blog post”
Self-promoting: “Luke just published this: http://cac.ophony.org/2008/07/24/status-anxiety/”
Philosophical: “Luke is”
Frustrated: “Luke is, but perhaps not according to Human Resources”
Resigned: “Luke isn’t”
Ironic: “Luke’s productivity is unaffected by the distractions of Facebook”
Literary (direct quote): “Luke is under the brown fog of a winter dawn”
Literary (reference): “Luke thinks the only thing keeping him visible is his whiteness”
Historical: “Luke thinks the run on Indymac echoes the Panic of 1893″
Informed: “Luke just got run over by Bob Novak”
Uninformed: “Luke thinks McCain is being too heavily scrutinized by the press”
Anticipatory: “Luke is looking forward to the new season of Mad Men”
Anguished: “Luke keeps writing the same &%#(*&@  sentence over and over again!”
Confessional: “Luke watched Steel Magnolias last night, and is still crying”
Curious: “Luke wonders how many kinds of status updates there are”
Evangelical: “Luke thinks there will never, ever, ever be anything like The Wire on TV again”
Nerdy: “Luke is a csstud and a phpimp”
Political: “Luke is chanting No Justice, No Peace”
Supportive: “Luke thinks that no matter what (redacted)’s dissertation adviser says, the work is top-notch”
Onomatopoeic: “Luke thump thump thumped three miles at the track” (that one is also alliterative)
Swinging: “Luke is be-bop-be-dee-bop”
Sporting: “Luke is yelling ‘Go Green’”
Stumped, Disinterested, or Over Forty: ” ”

Of course, there are other ways to announce your status, or lack thereof, to the world.  There’s Twitter, which gives you 140 characters to say what you’re up to (“microblogging,” they call it).  There’s the status menu feature of an instant messaging client.  There’s all sorts of ways to unify these statuses, to change them on the fly; or you can choose to keep them separate.

Yet, I imagine the following uttered in the border-state twang of a dear BLSCI comrade: “who cares?  I don’t want to know what you’re doing, and I don’t want you to know what I’m doing.”  Of course not.  A status update is not really a status update, but rather a chance to blast your friends with a small dose of personality to break up the monotony of the day.  It’s fun, it’s a challenge to be creative, and it’s a chance to stay connected with a community.