Surgical students are given a cadaver amongst groups of 8 to study for their first two years of med school. They dissect and examine every single sinew, strand and seam of the body. Collecting each part as they work. At the end of the two years they conduct a funeral and lay the body in its entirety to rest. Giving thanks for everything they've learnt and taking the time to say goodbye to someone they knew more intimately than their lovers.
The saying was that we all have 'skeletons in our closet'. More and more we must come now to accept instead that we have whole cadavers living in their thanks to the Internet. There is no escaping unless one is prepared to maintain vigilance over every media platform. The two years after any break up are now plagued by random 'friend requests', 'likes' and all manner of indirect Internet contact.
So lo and behold my unsuspecting Instagram has become this week's crime scene for all manner of paranoia. At first I thought it was probably harmless. And then as the 'likes' began to build, I realised I had established the 'no contact with exes' rule for a reason. No one likes to be reminded of their failures. Further more I don't know anyone who enjoys being reminded of bad times passed.
Like most women I conduct my own funeral after a break up. In the 90s I probably would have burnt everything but now, thanks to my 500GB hard drive I can just delete it all from digital life. The problem is that social media acts as a modern day herpes, resurrecting all those awkward dates, one night stands and worst of all exes you were sure you'd sent to the 'trash'. The mac icon lied to you, that loser is alive and kicking and sending you all manner of digital invites for you to agonise over.
What does it mean? Why does he now want to be your 'friend'? The girl who bullied you in high school probably has better motives than this guy. None the less there it sits, the usually blue icon lit up white with a luminous red 1 on your dashboard. Or better yet as these mediums are now so cunningly subtle in their efforts to streamline and condense each new application, there is merely a white whisper of 'thatloser is now following you' floating on your screen. What now? Panic, doubt, worry and the best part; frantic googling of how to block thatloser on any given social media.
I could be the better woman and ignore it but one 'like' too many just ticked me over the edge and combined with glorious #Girlfriend hashtags, in fact all the bloody hashtags, I decided enough was enough & I had deported that loser from my life for a good reason a year ago. I would now have to do it all over again. Call me neurotic, paranoid, cruel, whatever. The truth is its my life, digitally and literally. It's that simple. I choose to control my social media as best I can, whether its removing tags or blocking exes. Why shouldn't I? Hypocritical yes considering that the whole world can google me & end up here. But at the end of the day I hit publish on this thing - the buck ends with me.
When it comes to the cadavers in my closet, there are many. Frankly I'm not interested in meeting anyone whose closet doesn't rattle - their stories must be so dull. But I refuse to collect every piece for the next two years, study and examine it only to have to lay it to rest again.
Block user? Yes please.
