Ctrl + Alt + Delete

For close to a week now, my internet has been at its worst behavior in a long long time. Sulking for the first 3 days, it just refused to do anything. Then, after a lot of pleading with it (and even more yelling at the poor call centre guys at the AirTel helpline) it finally decided to work…. Well, kind of. It would decide, as per its whims and fancies what websites it does or does not wish to give me access to.

One of those that I was denied access to was my most frequented - Facebook (obviously! How else would “Revenge- The internet fights back!” be complete, right?!)

Frantically trying to get access from my kakka phone and just about being able to see what who’s up to and who has what to say, I spent the first two days logging on and off about 7 times a day! (Which seemed like a huge amount considering how otherwise I’d log in once, and log out once… 8 hours later!)

Slowly, I realized, though, that the lack of Facebook actually made me explore so much more. As stoopid as it may sound actually stating the obvious, it’s true! I started reading much more on the internet. I got further through my book. I caught up on movies I had lined up. I revamped my blog (which I think, in all modesty, looks SO cool now!) I took pictures instead of just looking through hoards of pictures of people I knew (more often than not. )

So it’s only now that I realize the problem I have. I know social networking is important, specially now when our Facebook page seems like our foremost identity (more important sometimes than our offline, real world self which may not look as good as our photoshopped profile pictures or sound as witty as our new, well thought out status messages. ) But I wonder often what it’s doing to our face to face time. I wonder if it's really as awesome as it seems.

For that matter, infact, all this fancy hi end technology and progress in communication, which is meant to bring us all closer and compress this already shrinking world even further, is actually taking away REAL relationships. I spend all day talking to you (chatting online/ sms/ bbm /facebook etc) and never really have much to say. Conversations are getting more and more inane, more and more shallow and less and less intimate.

Maybe these things work over long distances. You’re in India trying to co-ordinate a business deal in China, for a company in the US. That makes sense. Then technology is a God send! But if you’re within the same city, in a Kilometer’s radius, do you still need to constantly be connected? Is it better having a relationship with your phone (and other people as a result of that) than having one with real people?

Maybe I'll keep sending 100 text messages a day. Maybe I’ll have a Blackberry soon and become more active on my Twitter account. Maybe I’ll be “bbming” for the rest of my life. Maybe I’ll never buy a phone that costs more than 3000 bucks and spend all my money doing things I want to instead of things I think I want to, and still spend all my time talking on that 3000 rupee phone. Maybe I’ll always be as addicted to Facebook.

But maybe I won’t.

Now that I’ve realized this, I’m ready for rehab.

I’m ready to see if I can make my non-cyber-space life as much fun.

I am Kanika and I am an addict!