Log on

I am a fairly new member of facebook, and have been thinking a lot lately about what draws people to the website. The answer that came was community connection. We are hurtling into an age where we lack the most basic of connections to a greater community. The popularity of organized religion has waned so we no longer meet our friends and neighbors at our weekly service, or join in with other members in church activities. Our ancestors lived together in knit communities, the generations residing together in homes, grandparents living with children and grandchildren. Although some of this may still exist, it is not as common. Households are split apart by divorce and many people escape to the country or live with strangers in a metropolitan area away from relatives. Grandma goes into a nursing home where strangers care for her. Today's children text to stay in contact with friends instead of having sleep overs or riding bikes to the park. The need to connect with others is still a part of the human makeup, our cave people relatives all lived squished together in communities, huddled together for survival, hunting and gathering as a group. Maybe I am glorifying the past, but I sit here alone in my apartment, waiting for my son to get home from school. He will be the only contact I have with the outside world, until I log on and instantly get glimpses into other people's lives, friends and family that I will not meet at the church picnic or barn raising today. I get to participate in my friend’s lives for a few moments, but it is the connection with others that satisfies a very human need for relationship with fellow humans.