I don't want to assume that you've come here looking for me after finding my Meta pages dead. You’re probably my mom, or a distant friend I haven't seen in 10 years - hi :) - but if you have been searching, here am I. A part of me, anyway. My presence on social media has been truncated. In its place a sign from the universe - perhaps my time is better spent living life in real form. I've suspected it, but somehow the shocking prod of modern pressures and the pursuit of myself as some distant version of me out there on the horizon have driven me - an innocent cow - through the chutes of a present day (meta) reality to be branded and vaccinated, cleansed of my essential nature, and commoditized for your consumption and someone else's profit. Well, fuck that.
In February I got a message through Instagram that I had violated community guidelines with three of my posts. I wasn't informed what posts had been flagged, and I think that my Facebook account must have been hacked, but none of this was told to me, I had to piece it together on my own. I uploaded my ID to prove my identity as required by the site. After checking back occasionally over the next 8 weeks, I pulled up the page one day and was blandly informed that my account has been permanently disabled. I experienced a moment of grief, silently flooding with tears. I got angry. Mostly because it seemed very unfair that all the work and care that went into building something on that platform could be switched off with such sterility. For over 10 years these profiles were how I stayed connected to a community of other musicians, artists, friends and family.
My partner thought that I could get my profiles back if I wanted to badly enough. There are avenues I could have taken to get in contact with someone at Facebook to prove that I am who I say I am, but the biggest part of me - a part that will never need to be proven to anyone - told me to let it go. Let it fall off and see what happens. What about the argument that I need those profiles if I want to play music and book gigs, to be legitimate in this endeavor? The deepest part of me feels like something bigger is happening.
What do I need? What do I deeply desire, miss, long for? The real thing, baby. I care about the things that connect me to this earth. Things that connect me to others and bring out the humanity in me. I don't need something that quantifies me into groups of data, as though all the information that could be collected on me could make up the whole of who I AM. No. Those systems are tools that humanity has created, they are not That what creates us. I am willing to let go of the parts of my identity that don't give me what I need to live a strong, healthy, balanced life. And I'm curious what I'll create from there. I'm happy to share what I'm doing on this platform, and I am committing to showing up for my crafts - singing, writing songs, music, prose and poetry, taking photographs, painting, working with animals, and moving my beautiful physical vessel for the good of my soul.
As my good friend Brent Guilbauldt says, “Thanks for lookin and listenin!” Thank you for your support, I hope you feel free to comment and let me know how you're doing and what you're up to. I miss you. See you in the real world real soon 😘
Love ,
Megan