May 0923
Tweeting While On Vacation
May 23rd, 2009
I’m headed out for a short vacation today. Before I left the office, several co-workers asked me if I will be tweeting while I’m out. I had to pause for a second before responding with a “no, yes, maybe.” Hmmm….. Just what are the expectations these days about being on vacation and tweeting or maintaining your status on the various social networks?
When I’m on vacation, I like to really unplug, which is why my husband and I go to places like Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam, Prague, Costa Rica. We go to places where we’re not tempted to go online and work because there is so much to see and do; often, the time difference makes it difficult to stay in touch.
In the past, I might have dropped an e-postcard or quick e-mail to the office from an Internet cafe. But these days, with wireless access everywhere and social networks broadcasting everyone’s minute by minute status, what’s a girl to do? It seems all my friends and colleagues update their status wherever they are: on a date, at the beach, at dinner, at Disneyland, out West.
If we spend our time tweeting,updating our status on Facebook and MySpace, uploading photos to Flickr, or blogging about our experiences, are we really on vacation? Will I lose followers if I leave the grid for a while? Will anyone even notice that I haven’t blogged, tweeted or updated my status in a week? I bet not.
So, even though I have been on the grid and broadcasted my whereabouts, thoughts and food adventures pretty much daily for the past year, for the next week, I will likely just vanish from the Internet.
Unless I get free wi fi from my iPod Touch of course and I can use Twitter….. Argh. Have a great holiday.
May 24th, 2009 at 8:41 am
I went on a cruise in December, and I thought for sure the lack of Internet would drive me crazy. I am, after all, an e-mail junkie. But after the first day, I didn’t even think about it, let alone miss it.
Have a great holiday!
June 5th, 2009 at 8:08 am
From a blog post I recently read by Lane Wallace on this subject:
“And yet … there’s a unique kind of strength that comes from simply sitting in companionship with yourself and listening for what your heart or the world might tell you. Or allowing thoughts or events to percolate slowly against counter-thoughts, opinions, or trends. My best ideas don’t occur to me when I’m feverishly involved in churning out words. They come when I give my mind permission to listen instead of talk. To just be for a while. Undistracted. Undisturbed. And sometimes not even consciously focused on the problem at hand.
“That kind of space and silence may be a challenge to find in today’s world. But below is something that helps. Not just the view out my window, but my favorite place to sit and think. Where thoughts, questions, answers, perspective … and even the occasional hummingbird … have a way of finding me, once I turn off all the gadgets and the noise. “
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/05/in-praise-of-silence.html