Turning off facebook...and all the rest.

Social media has walked away with real community building, creating division and isolation. Yale Univeristy research states that, "Suicide deaths among 10- to 24-year-olds increased by 62% from 2007 to 2021. Research, released the summer of 2024, found that suicide is rising dramatically in preteens as young as 8 years old as well, with an 8.2% annual increase from 2018 to 2022". I watch children in grocery stores, and parks, and driveways, on their phones. I watch young adults crossing the street when the light turns green, staring at their phones instead of who might be ramming into them at any moment. I observe reckless interactions of unkindness across plateforms on facebook, etc. When I first started entering the facebook world years ago it was to stay connected with my kids, and now my grandkids (on Instagram) and family and friends. These days I absolutely love connectiong with my friends and family on facebook, however I find myself completely undisciplined, scrolling and getting emmersed in painful stories of unkind and treacherous behaviors. Anxious, and ever wakeful about the cruel and rapid distruction of our democracy occurring since January 20th, again! My question of how to engage in community building lingers in my heart.

Yesterday I decided to take a deeper path of discipline for myself and disengage in my habitual habit of scrolling the news for the next trump train wreck and checking out what everyone else was up to. Not my first rodeo in this endeavor, that is for sure! Ive been "blogging" since 2010. However, here I am, again. I have invited folks to join me here. So..If you have joined me here and are reading this, please comment, thank you! Know that writing is my way of resisting any and all repression, self inflicted or otherwise, that I am/have been feeling and experiencing in my life. Beginning as a child, the summer of about 11 years old or so, when I really wanted to run away. Hot summer day, on my bike, a little notebook and pencil, looking for a cool place to reflect and write. Wearing a summer dress with white leather loafer shoes. The bottom of the right shoe had a worn out hole and my foot would get burned from the hot street when I stopped on my bike. As a six year old child I did run away, across the street to Ellen Jane's house. Watching out our neighbor's window as my mother was walking across the street, cigerette in hand, to come get me. Ellen Jane had a quiet home of composer, which was a new experience for me, she was an artist, a painter. Don't get me wrong, our home was a haven for most of the kids on the block, but as the oldest of four, I needed quiet. I said to Ellen Jane, "Here comes my x-mother". Am I running away from the world? Not sure. I feel less anxious choosing less social media interaction and at the same time I don't feel any less informed. There are any number of ways to keep up with current affairs that are not harmful to the psyche. What is harmful to me is watching over and over again the continued distruction of our democracy.

Disengaging and refocusing with an action plan is a choice.

I am looking forward to continuing my writing here. As the days get longer and with Spring arriving, I'll be sharing what I'm planting in my garden. Sharing my experiences of a first time real vacation with my husband as we travel to new geographic areas, quiet places of solitude. I will also need to continue to share my ever constant fears for the safety of my family as we try and navigate what we can and cannot afford in the grocery store as prices continue to increase astronomically. I will share my continued fears of keeping my family healthy and safe and cared for with proper health care services. I will continue my fight for the protection of my family as we face the shut down of medicaid by this new administration. I will need to share stories of how I constantly worry and fret about how our grand children are going to get their medical and dental care needs met. How our son-in-law will be able to pay for his medical care and the heart medications he needs. How our daughter will be able to pay for her cronic asthma medications.

No I am not running away from the world. I am being crushed by the UNCONSCIONABLE cruelty of this new and damaging america...I am practicing breathing through to the next plan of action, seeking solitude for creating a nurturing plan with my family to protect and keep us safe. Is this where community building starts?

https://medicine.yale.edu/news-article/youth-suicide-is-on-the-rise-yale-aims-to-save-lives/

Photo from 8/2024, of me and my 13 year old grandson. We are at the Vancouver, Canada airport. We are on our way to Toronto to visit my daughter and her family. I do not need to be concerned for them in terms of their health care. Canada's health care system is called Medicare, and it's publicly funded. It's a universal health care system that provides essential medical services to all Canadian citizens and permanent residents.