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sunshine jen: Likes and Stars
When I was young, before there ever was an internet, I was a huge fan of the Star Wars movies (the original trilogy). For about a year before Return of the Jedi came out, I savored every bit of info I could get about Revenge of the Jedi. Most of my info came from the official Star Wars Fan Club newsletter which arrived in the mail every few months. Sometimes there was a black and white photo from the new movie. Excitement.
Nowadays, I surf the web to find out about the new Star Wars movie. I'm not looking for plot points, theories, or spoilers. I just want a little sweet amuse bouche to return me to that anticipatory excitement of my young self. Yes, it's an act of nostalgia on my part, but most movies these days are acts of nostalgia. The internet thrives on it.
Back in the good old days of the first decade of the new millennium, I started this blog. I took on a persona that was mostly me, but also partly someone I wanted to be. Somewhere in all those words, something sweet emerged. But it wasn't exactly me. It was a collection of words that came from me. It was more a painting than a photograph, an impression, not the exact thing.
Now I scroll through lots of photographs on my feeds. I even put up the occasional photo too. In the second decade of the new millennium, folks are just themselves on the internet. There is an expectation of sincerity and exactness. The amount of detail some people publish and share is amazing. I was never a sharer. I would rather mold stuff instead of just present it.
We are also in a time of likeability. Even though Facebook has a love button, a laughter button, an anger button, and others, I still go back to the like. It's simple. I like this. I like that. Then, at some point, I started to care about how many likes I was getting. That was a bad thing to start to care about, and my free flowing writing self became all dammed up. I started playing to what others wanted instead of myself. I stopped asking myself what do I want to write. Instead, I started asking, what do others want, and I've never done well with that questions.
Do I care about what others think? Sure. But when I'm throwing down words, that's my time, my space. I'm not trying this stuff out with a focus group.
Okay, correction, I do have a fictional focus group. It's made up of kittens. I have very strong kitten appeal. They think I'm purrfect.
Recently, my ride share app company informed me that I was a five star customer. Apparently, several drivers gave me five stars after I rode with them. I was surprised. I didn't do anything special. I just had some interesting conversations on the way from point A to point B. I wouldn't call it a five star conversation. I'm not that witty. I'm just happy the car had shown up.
It seems like every time I shop or ride or stay somewhere, I have to fill out an online survey or give my opinion. Part of me thinks that since the transaction happened well, you are not entitled to my opinion. But another part of me likes to give five stars or the highest rating. Life is hard enough. We should all get five stars for getting up in the morning, then another five stars for not burning ourselves with our morning hot beverage of choice.
Taking this all back to Star Wars, a new trailer came out on Monday. I liked it. Rey finally puts a coat on. Long Live Threepio. Lando! Chewie! Leia! What does it all mean? I'll find out in December.
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