A week without the news

As I say I have avoided the media before, but this is the first time I have done it while a big news story is on.  And this is a news story in which I am very interested.  But while I have had a few anxiety attacks and been close to opening up the news websites, on the whole I am feeling a lot calmer about everything.  Big weighty issues respond well to quiet reflection.  I am surprised at just how much my opinions have shifted in a week.


For a start, I am no longer angry with Conservatives.  I was literally pacing up and down rubbing my hair in frustration with them the week before last.  And I don't find that someone entertains the idea of wanting to leave the European Union makes me question their judgement any more.

But if it sounds like I am drifting to the right, I should point out that I am now more convinced than ever that Labour is the better choice of the two parties and that we should be remaining in Europe.  The less you focus on the details and the personalities and the more you think about the big picture the clearer it all is.

But I am also finding that I have more time to do other stuff that matters to me.  This isn't so much because I am spending less time on Twitter.  In fact I never spent that much time actually on Twitter.  I'd rarely spend more than 10 minutes during the day, and only spent prolonged times when I was too tired to do anything else.  But what I find is that not having Twitter in my life means I am losing the Twitter way of thinking.  I no longer think about things people have tweeted, nor how to respond to them.  And I don't think of ideas to tweet.  This isn't entirely a good thing.  We are social creatures and the society of Twitter is interesting and entertaining.  So I am missing out on some fun.  But on the other hand the stuff I am doing instead is quite good too.

Also, it is a mixed blessing not having the news in your life.  You miss out on a lot of trivia and stuff that was never of any importance.  But on the other hand it isn't exactly good to miss out on what is going on.  And it does mean that is something important does happen you will not know about it.  It is often said that not much really matters, and what does matter doesn't matter that much.  But I am not sure that is entirely true.   I think this election does matter.  And it might matter too much to accept the media's trivialisation of it.