Twitter Twaddle

I blame Steve Martin for this.

I have succumbed to Twitter.

Now, before you roll your eyes and call me an old "coot", I should tell you that I had already experienced the social networking thing with My Space, then Facebook, but proudly had been "off the grid" now for about a year.

A few years back, in the days leading up to my 20 year High School Reunion, I had innocently joined the Facebook craze, and happily got in touch with people from high school, college and old jobs. And yes, it was pretty great... for about 6 months. Then I realized why I had not kept in contact with these people for the last 20 years. Add to that the discovery that once you let one workplace acquaintance in, you better damn well let 'em all in. I was soon inundated with work "friends" who had all sorts of access to my embarrassing pictures, booze fueled status updates, and any other personal stuff that seemed fine to share when I was alone in my jammy jams staring at my laptop.

Worlds were colliding, and this lack of privacy became extremely unsettling for me. Then there were the myriad pointless updates of people I barely knew ("I am shopping today!"), and wacky photos of food people were eating ("Sushi!"), and I finally had to ask myself..do i really care? And the answer came in loud and clear: nope. So one day, much to Mr. Zuckerberg's dismay, I was off Facebook. I haven't missed it since.

The only thing that seemed worse than Facebook for me was this "Twitter" nonsense. First off, I really hated the name. And this whole thing about "tweeting"? Do we really need to spend precious hours in our day making birdy noises? Are we not adults here people? As far as I could tell Twitter was a streamlined version of the most annoying part of Facebook;the updates.  Then of course the first public face to endorse this was that honorable man of letters, Ashton Kutcher. I quickly became so sick and tired of being told to "follow us on Twitter", as if Carls Jr. or Applebees really had something up to the minute that I should be caring about.

Then, something strange happened. This goofy Twitter was being mentioned repeatedly during the Egyptian democratic uprising in early 2011. Apparently, some people were using Twitter not just comment on how the new Kanye West video, but rather to actually communicate with each other. While Americans were tweeting about how great the latest organic cupcake place was, halfway across the planet, hundreds of thousands were tweeting to each other about establishing democracy and overthrowing a regime. Perhaps this Twitter deal wasn't entirely silly after all. It was just Americans were using it in a silly way. (Shocker.) Other people around the world were using it to form communities, to overthrow governments and change their world. It was all rather moving.

I decided to call a truce on Twitter and not to hate on it so much. But there was still no way in heck I was gonna ever be a Twitter guy...I mean...who really cares about what I am doing minute by minute right? I sure don't. I saw no use in it.

Enter Steve Martin.

I love Steve. Love him. Ever since I was 7 years old listening to "King Tut" and playing his stand-up comedy records over and over. I am not just the casual fan who likes “The Jerk”, “Roxanne”, and “Parenthood”...oh no..I am the guy who worships "Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid", can recite over 90 percent of "The Man with Two Brains" and considers his "insolent waiter" cameo as the highlight of “The Muppet Movie”.

On another long commute with Karen up the 110 Freeway, I turned over to KPCC in my never ending quest to become smart. (See earlier blog.) A monotonous interviewer was speaking to someone with a familiar voice...It was Steve, and he was talking about his new book chronicling his experience with Twitter. ("The Tweets of Steve Martin"), and how much he enjoyed the medium. To him it was changing the very essence of how comedy could be communicated. As he began to read a few of his hilariously odd "Tweets", I looked over at Karen. She was playing on her phone. "I just joined Twitter" she said. At that instant, I knew I would join too. "Well..it would be cool to just follow Steve." I added. I was instantly flummoxed by all the "hashtag" and "retweet" mumbo jumbo and it took me a few days to know who was tweeting what, and when, and to whom, but eventually, I started to warm up to it.

About a week later, the other Twitter shoe dropped. I was at Pasadena's All Saints Church, to see my writing hero Anne Lamott, give a talk, and sign copies of her hilarious and touching new book. ("Some Assembly Required") Halfway through her talk, she mentioned that she had also recently joined the Twitter world, and was loving every minute of it. 30 minutes later, waiting in line to meet Anne and have her sign my book, I logged on to my Twitter and "followed" her, even sending her one of my very first tweets. So exciting! As the line progressed and I got closer and closer to meeting her, I started thinking about all the things I could possibly say to her. Should I mention that I am spiritual just like her? Should I mention that I am from the Bay Area too? Or that I am a fan of the Giants? I finally reached her.

"Hi, my name is Chris"

"Hi Chris"

"Hi Anne....I just joined Twitter too".

(In case you haven't noticed, I am really smooth with famous
people.)

I know that I could perhaps spend several more words on social media and our societal need to reach out to one another. I could maybe quote someone like E.O. Wilson and really try to sound thoughtful. But the Darwinian nature of the medium has really been interesting to witness. Friendster dies and MySpace arrives. MySpace dies, and Facebook emerges. One day Facebook and Twitter will die and something else will take over. (And probably something already has but I just haven't received my latest issue of "Old People Trying to Be Hip Monthly")

But for now,I am another convert to this thing called Twitter. And now, I am the one who will get down on my knees and humbly ask you...

"follow me on Twitter"

"@Clancyvox"

Whatever that means.