By Shelton Bumgarner
Many of us have someone we refer to as ``the one that got away,'' a person we should have dated or what not and it just didn't work out the way it should have. Once upon a time, memories of such people faded with time.
Now, however, things are different. With the advent of ``social media'' sites like Facebook, MySpace and Twitter ``the one that got away'' becomes ``the one I'm reminded of constantly.''
Thus, even though I live in Busan and she lives in Seoul, Facebook's ``newfeed'' keeps reminding me of what happened a long time ago. It's been a year since this particular little cyber romantic drama took shape and it doesn't get any better. The situation reminds me of the song lyrics, ``And how / can I forget you girl / when there's always something there to remind me.''
Maybe someone will write a song with the lyrics something like, ``Honey I'd forget you / but my Facebook newsfeed / is killing me with your missed touch. ''
This particular situation is yet another example of how technology is changing our social lives in subtle but significant ways while we're too busy making ``Facebook friends'' to notice. I'm sure Koreans experience such problems on Cyworld. I can't read Korean, so I wouldn't know.
With Facebook in particular, I feel like the services algorithms are out to get me. I mean, do I really have to be reminded of how beautiful, talented and generally wonderful the girl that got away is? Really, Facebook, why must you break my heart over and over again with your fancy matches? Instead of ``match maker / matchmaker / find me a match,'' should it be ``matchmaker / matchmaker / break my heart with your match?''
Is it possible that more than one romance will begin simply because two Facebook friends see each other on their mutual news feeds and they both come to the conclusion that they'd be perfect for each other? I have a hunch that maybe how often you check the person's account may determine how much you're seen in their newsfeed, but I don't know. It's just a guess. Maybe I'm letting my romantic feelings cloud my rational thought.
On the other hand, you have people using social media for hateful, if subtle, social discourse. While the most notable instance of this was the recent case in the United States of a young lady killing herself after a neighbor sent her a message on MySpace suggesting she kill herself, other ― and yet just as nasty ― types of discourse also exist.
I've heard of a fair deal of heartbreak being inflicted simply by what type of profile picture someone uses on MySpace or Facebook. It sounds rather silly describing it, of course, but if you find yourself in a love triangle, such matters can become quite important.
Romance has a way of adapting to any technology change that comes its way. Before the telephone, young ladies would have ``gentlemen callers'' who would sit in the ``front parlor'' while their parents kept a watchful eye. Now, parents often have to worry more about seeing their daughters on ``Girls Gone Wild'' than for a gentlemen caller's stolen kiss. Myself, and millions of others, know way more about Paris Hilton's private life than maybe we want to because of her leaked sex tape we saw on the Internet, but it hasn't prevented her from getting a date, now has it?
Thus, in some way, technology defines romance as much as romance is changed by changes in technology. Is it possible that the very notion of the ``one that got away'' will now be but a quaint, old fashion notion? We will no longer wistfully wonder ``what they're doing now'' simply because we're reminded of exactly what they're doing ― and who they're dating ― every time we turn on a computer and look at our Facebook newfeed.
As for me, it seems maybe this paper cut of a romantic heartache may over. These days, the one that got away no longer shows up on my Facebook newsfeed that much, but she continues to show up in my heart. And that, my friend, is an update you can count on.
Shelton Bumgarner, the original co-founder of the English journal ROKon, is a writer and photographer working at an English institute in Busan. He can be reached at migukin@gmail.com