Thank you, Mark Zuckerberg.

Facebook.  The word used to mean something entirely different.  One upon a time, colleges distributed a yearbook-type collection of photos of the incoming freshmen class allowing newbies to identify people whose names they may or may not remember from orientation week, and upperclassmen to decide which attractive and as-of-yet unjaded freshmen ladies to invite to their fraternity parties to ply with garbage can punch.  Now Facebook is a worldwide social media phenomenon.  And I love it.

Yes, Facebook is the source of a lot of inappropriate over-sharing   I thank my personal saints there was no Facebook back in my college days so no photos currently exist of my wearing high-waisted jeans and a black body suit, drinking a concoction called "Moose Piss", and dancing to "O.P.P".  And my sorority hazing days?  I think I might have wound up going viral.  The once-removed quality of this forum of communication makes it far too easy to post far too personal information.  Aside from not wanting to see blurry pictures of you doing Jaeger bombs, I also don't necessarily want to know your political and religious views.  I know you through the preschool, I like you and think you are normal. Don't ruin that by posting right-to-life rants, or a diatribe about the one percent.  Facebook is the ultimate "it's all about me" free fire zone and I have learned some uncomfortable things about people I used to think I had a lot in common with.

Facebook is also the home of the under-whelming mundane share - like what you had for lunch or the fact that you can't sleep.  Some people feel the need to share every aspect of their average lives.  If the topic is going to be lame, you'd better be hi-friggin-larious about it.  The other two posting faux pas are winebooking and vaguebooking.  Winebooking is pretty obvious.  Stay at home, drink too much, then start tapping away.  You will leave inappropriately long comments on friends' baby's photos or get overly sentimental with those "friends" you have had no contact with since graduating from high school.  And this is only the suburban-mom-and-Chardonnay variety.*  I can not even imagine the single-gal-about-town version where there are a stable of exes to embarrass yourself with.  With a worldwide audience, it's drunk dialing times a bajillion.  Vaguebooking, a term now found in the Urban Dictionary, is "posting an intentionally vague or one-worded status update, alluding to something else."  Some vaguebooking is funny and meant as a private joke.  Though it is usually of the complaining variety and is essentially, the Facebook version of sitting in a corner at a party, crying.  Posting things such as, "I don't know why I bother anymore", you are passive-aggressively demanding your friends ask "what's wrong?".   Be a grown-up and either bitch about it directly to get the support you need, or shut up about it.

You learn a lot about people you are "friends" with on Facebook because a lot of them are really just acquaintances.  Sure, you have your family and besties on there, but also the guy who sat next to you in AP Chem and a gal you used to wait tables with in college.  When you first sign up for Facebook, it's fun and exciting  to get back in touch with people you genuinely liked once upon a time, but then it becomes an exercise in awkwardness as people you really didn't want to reconnect with send you friend requests.  Suddenly, the girl who made your life a living hell in eighth grade wants to be cyber friends?  Ignore the shit out of that.  I set strict limits for myself friends-wise.  It may sound harsh, but with very few exceptions, I don't friend locals.  I don't need some mom I barely know telling me at pick up how fun my annual girls' weekend with B was or seeing funny pictures my sister posts.  I like to keep worlds a little bit separate, thanks.

Despite all these negatives,  I am not about to quit any time soon.  Yes, there are those holier-than-thou people (like H) who have no interest in it, but I think for most of us (normal) people, Facebook is about connection.  We can be more involved in the lives of our far-off pals and loved ones.  Through Facebook, I have a daily relationship with my sister, KK.  We post goofy things on each other's walls and it's like she's still in the bedroom next door, not on the opposite coast.  I have also made new friends through my Facebook friends.  Going to visit KK last winter, I felt like I already knew half the people I was going to "meet" for the first time.  And after a recent wedding, Facebook allowed me to stay in touch with some fun people we met.  For those of us who work in rather adult-sparse fields like stay-at-home-motherhood, popping on Facebook is like taking a stroll to the watercooler or breakroom.   I can see a funny cartoon that makes me laugh, or notice a few people like the photo of me and H* that I posted.  It gets my head out of the game for a few minutes and puts me in a better mood. Where was this site when I was stuck at home with three babies?

The thing I love the most about Facebook though, is that it's the lazy person's scrapbook.  I'll admit, I only post flattering photos of myself and family and about good events in my life*** - because who the hell wants to hear me bitch? See vaguebooking above.  So when I used the Year in Review tool (LOVE) I saw all the exciting, fun things my family and I had done in the past year and, DAMN!  Facebook is like a sieve I can use to strain out all the daily bullshit and see the wonderful highlights of a pretty fantastic life.

I'm just glad it doesn't include any pictures that are PG13.

*Which I have not initiated, but been the victim of on several occasions.
**Who acts like he in a goddamn witness protection program with his protests.
***See the cartoon above.

Let's hug it out.

"Can I have a kiss?"

"Let's snuggle."

"Hug me tighter!"

I wish those were H's words, dear readers, but these are direct quotes from my five year-old son.  My friends told me, before I had Little Man, that boys were more physically affectionate, but I was not prepared for this level of intensity.  He loves nothing more than to snuggle in my lap, put one hand on either side of my face, and stare into my eyes with his nose pressed firmly against mine.  I think he would crawl back in if I would let him.

Little Man's love of physical contact has never been limited, by any means, to his family.  As a toddler, when he made the usually terror-inducing mistake of coming up and hugging the wrong woman's leg at the park, he simply looked up at his new friend and smiled while continuing to hold firmly to her limb.  In preschool, any injury, physical or emotional, his classmates suffered, LM tried to cure with a warm embrace.  He was, and is, in love with the world at large, and this has served him well.

Until now.

Since the start of the rough world of kindergarten, LM's caring ways have begun to be rebuffed.  Where, just a year ago, a hug at the end of the playdate was a mutual affair, now, more often than not, it is met with arms stiffly held at the recipient's sides, or worse, an uncomfortable pulling away.  In a matter of months we went from, "Hugging?  OK, cool.", to "WTF, man?", and Little Man is not socially aware enough to notice the change.  So I am the one left to stand there cringing inside asI see my son put himself out there to be rejected and I want to die every single time.

I think there are several factors at play.  First, he is in class with a whole new group of kids, having gone to preschool in a different town.   Much like that guy in college who got harmlessly grabby after a few beers, at his old school, everyone knew LM at "The Hugger", and they just accepted it as part of his package.  Now, plopped into a new social scene, his new classmates, aren't used to my affectionate guy.  Second, there are a ton of boys in his class who are either a full year older, having been held back in preschool to mature, and boys who are the youngest of many male siblings.  Both of these groups have been exposed to the more masculine world of older boys, even if only by a year, so LM's behavior seems babyish and, therefore, repellant.

I have to confess, in an effort to smooth his way socially, I have been trying to curb the hugging by replacing it with another behavior.  "HIGH FIVE GOODBYE!", I cheerfully shout when our playdates are coming to an end.  Instead of dropping the hug, LM does both, now creating a whole goodbye procedure.  Rats.

There just seems to be such a narrow band of acceptable social behavior for boys, and I was not prepared for it.  Now this is where I get comments like "Let him be himself!", "He shouldn't change for the world around him!", both of which are true statements.  But, DAMN, there is nothing harder than watching other kids laugh at your kid for something harmless and your instinct as a parent is to make it stop. I absolutely refuse to make LM feel badly about his predilection for physical connection, even though I do worry about what it will mean for him socially.  In fact, my desire to change his behavior is  to protect him from shame.  The last thing I want is for some kid to call him "queer" on the playground.  I would like to channel his loving nature, rather than have it shattered.   I just want him to still be who he is without being ridiculed.

At some point, I'm sure he will change.  And I'm hoping that change is gradual and gentle.  My next plan of action is to start talking about personal space.  Pointing out that not all people like to be touched in that way and perhaps we should reserve our closest embraces for our dear friends and family.  I will use his father, uncles and grandfather as a prime example.  They all hug hello and my father in-law kisses all his grown sons.  They are the perfect balance of masculine affection.  His youngest uncle, much like LM, is a notorious hugger.  My dream is for LM to wind up just like him.

Like a normal version of Tommy Boy. "Brothers don't shake hands, brothers hug!"