My So Called Digital Life
Friday.
Getting back home , I was very,very mellow.
A male friend of mine and I went out too see a band preform French pop songs at El Cid. The woman was half Asian and half French. For driving him over he bought me a drink. I wanted a Margarita on the rocks but not with the cheap stuff they usually make it with.
I ask for some tequila Cazadores - an extra tall glass shows up on my table. It makes the sweetness of the female lead singer - cuter.
It also knocks me out - I head home early-ish for a Friday night. I am hyper mellow.
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Laura is Face-Booking up a storm at home. She was not turned on by the prospect of cute femme French Pop.
I get home and she is mind-welded to the screen. In the meantime my lower back is tightening up. I flop onto the bed, shirt off. I had applied one of those 8 hour heat pad things on my lower back and it had worked, but late into the day it was wearing off. But now I wanted a tequila chaser just to see if I could relax even more. It did not work - I was caught between tightening muscle pain and alcoholic relaxation.
Bored I grabbed the recent bane of my existence - my Digital camera. I had started to take pictures with it but had no real clue how to use the damn thing for real. It takes shots that are too light, too dark, too shaded green, too shaded blue or too muddy.
I ask if I could take pics of her - no go. I decide to take pics of myself. Just to see what the lighting would bring.
I keep my shirt off and take off my glasses. I am wearing baggy boxer shorts. they can double for real shorts in hot weather.
“Yo - baby - take my picture !” - I lay across the bed. She took a full body shot.
“OK - loooook at his pixy smile! - You look like a merman!”
She turned back the mac. I grabbed the camera.
I look at the pic - its me laying on the bed - it was unbelievably cheesy.
I adjust the settings on the hunk o electronics and feverishly press on the delete key.
I wanted something not nerdy - I had been taking pictures on the weekends and have found myself looking, harmless. There may not be too much red blood in me but right then and there I wanted to transcend my casual nerd image. I wanted something - creepy, hinting on a red meat hunger. Leering but not explicit.
I confess - we live in times that do not engage a part of the hetro male experience - at lest for myself personally - in an intelligent way. Its a creepy, leeringly energy that also ties in fear and physic violence into art. I was feeling a digital and self socialized castration with my life choices. I wanted to acknowledge this part of myself - but even drunk I am way too self aware of do’s and dont’s.
I turn the camera around. I take a shot with myself on the bed, very close up to my face. Flipping the camera over I see an extreme close up, the lighting is muted and natural.
A hint of a smile comes across my face.
This pic hinted at being kinda, creepy.
Cool.
I pull the camera back and then turn on the side light.
“Yo, baby. - now take my picture”
Upset she turns away and then take a few pics. - I am still am shirtless.
Then she goes back to the flat-screen.
I lazily scan the pics. I think that look, on the whole, creepy.
A perverse smile crosses my face.
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Later I fenagle my way back on the interwebs and my baby takes a break.
I decide that if she is going to waste the night, she should at lest have the privilege of seeing me in a picture pose in a way that said - yo baby - see me smirk half naked.
One FaceBook login later I post some of the pics - mostly close ups - and post one pic of me with no glasses or shirt on leaned over a wooden TV tray with my arm posed in a way that looked - to me anyway - like I was asking her what the F was up.
I know the pattern, when she wants to do the little applets she will be up all night. I will be awake early then just delete the topless picture. The close ups I could keep. Anyway its nothing that anyone would not be able to see with some beach photos.
I don’t think anyone would notice. Friday night the majority of people would be out. The ones who would be tolling the FB are the straight male single guys. They would not care.
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I wake up. Its early.
In the haze before the coffee celerity, I delete the shirtless pic of myself on Facebook.
Cool. If any of my friends have any sense - they would not be online this early after a friday night. The ones who were - well they probably would not care about my pics.
I get to the coffee maker - java kicks off my day.
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Caffeinization finished - I head out for the daily chores.
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Headed out I go to an afternoon volunteer staff shift at the local lay Nichiren Buddhist center. I do it once a month.
Its a very low key role. Younger people do most of the busy work, I have to deal with most of the staff level issues - such as calling a plumber and dealing with schedule conflicts. In the middle of a Saturday afternoon those issues are non existent.
I decide to get some Diamoku (Buddhist chanting) in. I try and focus. The mantra resounds in the room as a group of people from all walks of life, age groups and ethnicity's. Its a major reason I love the SGI - its really diverse.
A women I know and have been friends with for a long time sits next to me. She is a survivor of the 1980’s heavy metal music scene.
“Hi R”
“Hello”
---you know Ken. I liked your new photos on FaceBook.
(!!!!) Mental spit take!!!!!)
Ummm - I - ack (internally mortified!!!)
“No really I thought they were very tasteful. You were really aiming to kill the computer nerd image”
“ - well Laura took them - I”
“She did a good job - I thought they were really - showed a different side of you, but they were not sleazy - I liked them! “
“- I have a few more that I did not put on facebook - not explicit but they are in the same vain”
“ I would love to see them”
“ Well I do want a bit more feedback - I will let you get a sneak peak and you give me your honest opinion”
We bantered on for a little bit more. There is an authentic feeling of admiration in her voice.
In tossing a satirical digital tease to Laura I was not counting on being eye candy for a middle aged women. It was not in the cards. As I drove home I was trying to assimilate what I was feeling.
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What i was feeling was taking be a bit to absorb. Feeling something new is - for someone who lives in his head - something that can fool yourself into denying that you feel it.
It was after a bit coughed up the emotional honesty to reveal to myself what i was feeling.
I was being admired for my physical presence. I kinda .... liked it.
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Slightly broke and not interested in the options we had that night I put on the cable box. Takeout Thai and the itunes provide the soundtrack for the night.
I reviewed the pics - what I saw was grainy pictures. Nothing explicit or nasty. Just - kinda.... goofy.
I pick up the camera. I change the settings and place myself next to a naked light-bulb in front of a mirror.
Lets see if I can make something a bit more - eye opening. I take self photos in the bathroom mirror. The light made the shots orange. A twist of my torso and I have my set of pictures, this set tried to suggest something seductive but goofy.
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In the meantime one of the photos on Facebook caused a minor controversy - I was on a running argument that one of my harmless photos - a picture of my from the shoulders up - was way too creepy.
I protested its just me backlight in a grainy photo- but I had no control over the interpretation of what people saw. My own brother thought I was giving out a ‘fuck me” face.
I did not see that at all - and his wife thought he was being cruel. But he did say something that gave me pause. I was the one who placed something that can be interpreted in many ways on the internet.
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I look-over my Facebook friend landscape - its an impressive grouping of work mates, fellow Buddhists, musicians, artists, family, barflies and strangers.
I begin to understand what it means - it means that you will never lack for someone to go out and do something with - you will be invited to more then you can attend. You will be asked to go to breakfast by someone you have not seen in years out of the blue.
But there is a price. In the blurring communal context of Facebook the danger of being misinterpreted is ever present. Even a bit of playful interaction can be looked at as digital infidelity.
Future potential network connection may be spoiled if I at in a way that is too id driven. its a lost in a way - part of my personality is raunchy, goofy, silly and nasty. In a digital way FaceBook is the 1950’s - a subtle but continuous way to keep within a boundary of actions.
In contrast Myspace is the abandoned inner city 1970’s hood that has fallen into squalor - because no one is there, your do not care what you do, say or interact with. I proclaimed I was a Bi curious 3’44 foot swinging bodybuilder for a couple months and no one cared.
I deleted a few of the pictures I had on Facebook, got rid of a few suggestive comments and then cleaned up my notes. My persona is as bland as i can make it without losing my mind.
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I place the photos in a locked account on Photo Bucket - then sent a link to my friend - she liked them - they showed a more sultry side
I liked the praise, but I don’t need it per say.
I would miss the ability of my id to scream like a 16 year old at times.
