The Endless Posts of the Faithless

“Oh me! Oh life! of the questions of these recurring,” – Walt Whitman

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Note: This is the start of a new set of posts about my writing journey. You can find my novel here → “Finding a Best Friend”

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“Uncle Walt,” Robin Williams called him in his role as Prof Keating in The Dead Poets Society.

The poem continues:

Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,

Could that be an apt description of the world today, or more like the World Wide Web?

How many social media sites are filled with people searching endlessly? For what? Likes? Views on their TikTok videos, hoping they’ll go viral someday? Or maybe they are binge-scrolling Facebook or Instagram or YouTube?

Even on here, how many of us post Notes or scroll through Notes endlessly, hoping to persuade the Substack algorithm to give us a chance to be seen?

How many Notes have we seen announcing “I have 2k subscribers!” while I have two, which include Mom and her hairdresser?

So, I, like everyone else, post notes and subscribe to people’s stacks in the hopes that they’ll subscribe to mine. But Substack is a place to read, not pass notes, so I make the effort to read the stacks I subscribe to. If I had 2k+ subscribers, I would have an endless list of my subscribers’ posts to read. I would have to navigate carefully between providing my scribers content while reading theirs.

Uncle Walt continues:

Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)

Do I really think I can dare to hope for 2,000 subscribers? Or post a viral video on TikTok? Or find instant fame on the internet? What’s the point of doomscrolling reels on Facebook, Instagram, or YouTube?

In the days long ago in high school, there was always a group of those kids. The elites. The popular. The smartest ones. The envy of everyone in school.

You could either spend your days in misery, wishing you could be part of that crowd, or realize you were part of your own crowd with your own loser friends and be just as content.

Now, with the internet, there is a single large community. One group of elites, the influencers. There can only be a limited number of viral videos. There can only be a handful of YouTube channels that people watch. Not everyone can have 2k+ subscribers, or the number of subscribers wouldn’t mean much.

Uncle Walt continues:

Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,

Is it any wonder that the world is so filled with anxiety and depression? Everything is such a competition, and the other competitors are the rest of the world. How many of us are caught up in “the plodding and sordid crowds?”

We “vainly crave” the limelight, only to realize that it doesn’t shine on the whole world. We spend our “useless years” seeking but never finding. We are all entangled in this web.

The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?
Answer.
That you are here—that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.

The powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse! That’s why I’m on here. That’s why I write. Not to get thousands of subscribers, not to make millions on my debut novel, but to add my voice to the millions of others who have put pen to paper, caressed the keys of a typewriter, or waved their magic mouse over the computer to create digital media they spread instantly around the world.

Too many of us feel like our voice is drowned out by the tide of ever-increasing noise of the world made manifest through the internet. Perhaps, this massive confusion isn’t an explosion of distracting noise, but rather a chorus. We can add to the song, instead of wasting time on the endless paths of the faithless on the World Wide Web. That’s what I hope to contribute.

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Thus far, my stack has consisted of chapters from my first book. I think it’s time to add some posts about parts of my writing journey. So, Mom, make sure your hairdresser checks in on my stack from time to time, instead of scrolling Facebook. I’d like to have an audience.