What’s the haps?
Before my trip to the hospital, I began writing a piece about how I get my world news. It was going to be something along the lines of this:
You guys are my news source.
Which is very, very true. You all give me the haps.
I discovered just HOW true during my convalescence, when using my iPoodle to check in with people seemed entirely too difficult. I was worn out from back-to-back surgery and didn’t feel like messing with all your nonsense about ice buckets and nudie-pics. After almost dying, your trendy bullshit seemed trivial, and I couldn’t muster the energy to explain how stupid you’re being for getting caught up in all that crap.
So I unplugged for about a week.
Which left me protected in a soft, ignorant blanket of Everything-Is-Okay. I snuggled into it and let the White Privilege, American Ignorance wash over me in a faux wave of World Peace. I was blissfully unaware of the haps, and it felt pretty goddamn terrific. I’m trying to say all this in such a way as it comes across that I know how fucking lucky I am to even have a choice in the matter.
I don’t get the news – the haps – via traditional methods.
I haven’t picked up a newspaper in years.
Our TV only picks up Netflix and Amazon Prime.
My radio is Pandora.
No newspaper, television, or radio news has entered my home in well over a decade. And yet, I still know what’s happening in the world – until I unplugged, that is.
Them interwebz are a wonderful thing.
I don’t scour news websites.
The only sites saved in my favorites are writing-related; inspirational self-help ditties; personal challenges; creativity boosters; and mundane sites like our local school and the library.
With friends like you, who needs news?
And I don’t mean that facetiously.
I mean that factually and with gratitude.
Because you people in the world react to events the moment they occur, and since you have such differing perspectives, I get a rounder picture of the affair than any news outlet could hope to offer.
I have to take breaks from Twitter and Facebook often, and usually for days at a time. Not always, as I have led you to believe, because of the stupid things people post, the asinine opinions being passed off as facts, the cruelty and shitty behavior… but sometimes because you do your reporting entirely too well.
You report everything and it’s overwhelming.
I can’t keep up with all the earthquakes and stories of child abuse and rape and the thing that’s happening in Missouri and the school shootings and the political machinations and all the fucking SAD that’s happening every moment of every day.
It’s too much.
It’s killing my heart.
So I disappear.
The silence is Golden, but then I eventually realize I can’t just live in a cocoon or behave like an ostrich with my head in the sand.
So I come back to you. I always come back. And I’m always glad I did. Because, even though it’s like pouring boiling oil over my soul, it beats the alternative:
Staying in the dark and choosing to remain ignorant.
Stagnation is a slow death all of its own.
These last few weeks are the longest I’ve gone clueless with regard to the world’s haps. And while they have been restful, I’m ready to come back, dive in, see what you crazy kids have been up to.
I hope you didn’t fuck things up too much while I was gone.
I also decided to be a grown-up and download a couple news apps onto my iPoodle, just in case you start posting lies.
But you guys would never pass on information that’s untrue and potentially dangerous, right?
Riiiiiiiiiiiight.
- Have you ever unplugged? For how long? And why? How did it feel?
- What’s your favorite news source? TELL ME IT’S NOT FOX.
- Do you get the haps via newspaper, online news reporting sites, or, like many people, Facebook posts?