Instagram Whispers

I miss the days when Facebook used to be a park where words came
to play. When the empty noise of real life drove you crazy, you could
come and sit on a bench in this playground, watching the words
do their thing. Occasionally, you could engage with them,
but only if you wanted to. And even when you did, these words
were shy, respectful, sometimes, filled with a little mischief,
like the smile of a child who throws a snowball at you.

These words are now grown up in an evolved Facebook world.
Likewise, they are all brash and bragging, screaming and begging
for attention in an exclamation party. Shallow anecdotes make out
with 90-character trivia in a one-night-stand. Opposing worldviews
punch each other in heady bar brawls until the other bleeds
into oblivion. Meaningless, hankering for more meaninglessness.
Just like life.

Perhaps, that's why I like Instagram now. I guess, if a picture is worth
a million words, then a million pictures say a lot, without speaking
anything. That kind of quiet warmth that you get when you are inside
a tent wrapped under a dense canopy. The kind of peaceful murmuring
only trees can do. And nestled inside my tent, I can experience what
the words originally set out to be, what they were always meant to be:
comfortable solitude.