The New Catch-22
“Catch-22” comes from the title of Joseph Heller’s 1961 novel. In the story, “Catch-22” was a rule followed by army doctors in The Second World War. If a frightened pilot tried to avoid a dangerous mission by claiming he was “insane,” this was seen as healthy and the doctor would diagnose him as “sane” and eligible to fly.
In contrast, any pilot who actually wanted to fly was marked as “insane” and would not be allowed to do so. So “Catch 22” was the perfect example of an illogical rule, which made everyone unhappy. After the release of a film based on the book in 1970, the phrase “a Catch-22 situation” or “a Catch-22 fix” became widely used to mean a paradoxical problem.
On the ApeCast last week, David told a story about finally getting a day off from his relentless work schedule and spending the day free of social media. That wasn’t the point of the day. The point was to hang out on a boat on a beautiful day with his dad. The escape from Faceborg was a side benefit.
He got home and just before bed he opened his phone to check out the ongoings of a thousand people. Not because he was interested in what his friends or family had posted online but to see what the raging masses of idiots had written. He realized it was simply to become annoyed with the avatars of humans he could despise.
Not long ago (I actually can’t remember the day, so I can’t know how long ago) I hit the wall with social media. I found myself glued to it for what amounted to hours a day and that the effect was a low-grade disgust for everyone. It seemed that my job, on top of being a casino manager, a husband, a writer, was also to sit in judgement of every person around me with the impulse to share his/her thoughts publicly.
I didn’t sign up for that employ so I quit.
I deleted my Faceborg account. I deleted my Twitter. For some reason I kept my Instagram.
The new Catch-22 is that with social media, I am trained to hate my fellow humans. Without it, I feel like the world is passing me by. Keep the accounts, hate people. Lose the accounts, miss them.
I grew up bouncing around. We moved a lot during my most formative years. The result is that I don’t give a lot of stock to the idea of a stable home or group of friends. When, as a tyke, I’d make great friends in the fourth grade only to move to another state for fifth grade, the roots of livelong community were not allowed to grow. Thus I am an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ sort of jackass.
Tom Flaherty was my best friend in fourth grade. Peoria, AZ. Alta Loma Elementary. We rode our bikes over construction mounds in the desert. We created a pancake stand as a response to all the lemonade stands on our block because I’m an idiot contrarian and Tom thought it was funny. In the cinema of my mind, that year was filled with Stand by Me revelations (no dead body, though) and Tom and I were nothing short of bosom buddies.
Then we moved. I can’t recall where we moved but I think it was still in Arizona. Tom became part of that tapestry hung in the corner only casually referenced once in a while when I think of dirt bikes or pancakes.
I’ve been married twice before Dana and had a four year relationship with another woman in Chicago. I don’t have a single photo or reminder of them. Out of sight, out of mind. That whole rolling stone sans moss metaphor is on point. No moss on me, gang.
Social media, however, is moss. Lots of green, sticky fucking algae. Would Tom and I be Faceborg friends? Who knows? It’s as likely that he doesn’t even remember I existed. My deletion has had few negative side effects. Literate Ape has less exposure as does my ability to market my own website. I’m not as plugged into the lives of people I care about and both my mother and mother-out-law no longer have access to photos of Dana. Once in a while, I get that addict’s twinge of wanting to be in the know but I have plenty of doomscrolling I can do with so much news media.
When Dana and I split for Vegas, I’d been a resident of the Third Coast for thirty years. Thirty years gathers a lot of moss but I’ve found that those memories and attachments tend to become distractions in the now. Social media chained me to the going ons of people and institutions I no longer had stake in. After a year and a half in the Silver City, there are only a handful of people and things about Chicago I’d have reason to see should I ever decide to visit. A few friends who have become essential to me. One bar. One restaurant. Not much else.
For the most part I’m happier without the non-stop reminders of that chapter. Eliminating the online nagging of missing out of things I used to live within has opened me up for my new home. I’m not sure what Nevada has in store for me especially in the slow descent into economic madness and gradual rebuilding that must occur eventually but free of the presence of Chicago is the only way to dive in.
And still…when news of Chicago comes on the televisions in the casino, I perk up.
Catch-22.