The fragments of her journey of faith, the ponderings of her heart, the photography she uses in attempts to capture her world, accompanied by many a cup of tea.
It's been a good two months since my last Instagram update. I have to admit, I've been cheating on my Instagram a bit recently by using photographs from my big girl camera and editing them, but these are all photos which my good old HTC One has taken. A recurring theme, most of them revolve around Tower Bridge because I'm there every day and I do see some spectacular sunsets that are too good not to 'gram.
The quality of some of these are extremely variable and that's one thing that I really dislike about Instagram: using their editing software seems to completely bodge the quality. You can definitely tell which ones I have used vscocam for (yep, I've become an Instahipster, help me), especially that moody latte art shot.
At the top in the centre is a rare breed of photo from my Instagram - something other than sunsets, architecture or a latte art moment of pride, but something which points you forward to another upcoming scrapbooking blog post. These were not cheap to print but came out in a beautiful matte finish and the perfect size to make into pages, write around and add a little something extra to my scrapbook, otherwise all the cherished snaps on my phone would never leave the abyss of the internet.
You can follow me on Instagram if you would like - @mosaicofantonia. Give me some links to follow you! My favourite kind of Instagrams are those which don't just indulge in poorly lit selfies and endless hashtags of every single word that you want in your caption. There is a girl in Australia who I follow who does the most charming shots of coffee and of her in floral crowns and I feel like she is living a fairytale through her Instagram. I've journeyed through her Instagram for over a year and honestly would quite like to be a penpal of hers. Her name is @athenagracee and I thought that she probably deserved a little plug as she has pretty much inspired the way I used Instagram.
Who inspires how you take photos and capture your life via Instagram?
Spending my evening flitting between Youtube and my Facebook, I stumbled across a video shared by a friend that I thought relayed an important message for a generation where technology becomes a replacement for face-to-face interaction. This video, "Look up", has over 700,000 views on YouTube and a very interesting discussion going on in the comment section about the pros and cons of social media and the new world of technology that we are engrossed in.
Firstly, I have to give a huge applause to how the creator of this outstanding video communicated his ideas, using a moment where a human interaction lead to a whole life with a stranger imagined out but one which could have been easily snatched away by our reliance on technology. Of course, it is dramatised and we sit there and feel that it is highly unlikely that we would miss out on such a huge part of life simply by looking up directions on Google maps rather than asking a stranger, but I feel like it emphasises many of his other points. I remember a life where children weren't just plonked in front of a TV as their source of entertainment, and I regularly lament the fact that I don't go out and just explore the world as I used to as a child, with a love of the outdoors, for playgrounds and for imagination. I hugely dislike the fact that iPads in particular are being bought for children's use rather than them building a fort, picking up some drawing pencils, or creating their own games with friends which leads to crucial development. In my own adult life, I have turned to scrapbooking to escape my default actions to check my various social medias or to watch TV that I don't even enjoy simply because I haven't thought imaginatively of anything else to do.
I have experienced times where I have sat down with a friend for coffee and the conversation quickly turns to things that we saw on Twitter or Facebook rather than actually discussing things in our hearts. Worse, I have sat down with friends only for them to check those apps rather than speak to the person sitting in front of them, with the only involvement on my part being listening to things that they are reading from their feeds. The title, "Look up", is apt for this situation, and something that I often want to scream at people this happens because I feel dehumanised, replaced by a communication facade.
He also makes the point that social media is where we "show our best bits, but not our emotion", and in many ways I wholeheartedly agree. There are the odd few that are almost that bit too honest over the internet, but largely we paint pictures of ourselves that we want others to see whether we are aware of it or not. We become a person without much of a personality. Too many times I have been obsessed with recording a moment to share rather than simply experiencing it and enjoying the company of those around me, whether that be in the form of an Instagram, a tweet or a Snapchat story. I also agree that social media creates a feeling of loneliness: how many people sit on Facebook for hours, with many people online chatting, just not to them? Even then, the chats are full of distractions from the six other tabs open in your computer as you shop for a new pair of shoes, look up a holiday, scroll through twitter or a news website (or even write this blog...). You are rarely given full attention and with delayed replies and the inability to read someone's face or tone of voice miscommunication is frequent and conversations can trail off with no official ending.
However, I also see the benefits of it. Twice I have done a 48 hour blackout from technology: my social media, my phone, my laptop. I also didn't speak for those 48 hours, so this 21st century fast was probably one of those most isolated I have ever felt because I had very few ways to communicate, and in that time I longed for just one conversation over text which could quell that loneliness. I have seen the rise of vlogging and the amount of people who find community in comments sections of blogs and weird corners of the internet. I just wonder if this community comes at the expense of friendship which involves eye contact and real 'lol' moments rather than the constant sound of typing on a keyboard and emoticons replacing any form of body language.
Something that I know I need to do is to communicate more, especially at a time where all the friends I have had for years are scattered across the country: this just made me realise the value in doing it face-to-face, to look up and make time and not use technology as an excuse to be lazy with the friendships that I have.
It has been rather a while since I stopped rambling on about myself and just let some photographs do the talking. I tend to use a lot of my photographs from Instagram in my monthly updates but as many of them are fairly poor quality once edited from my phone I have been including fewer and swapping them for a more slick photograph from my big-girl camera. However, as they are a fair reflection of my life and as I do tend to keep my Instagram full of London sights and moments that truly are captured on the go in my commute or just as I walk the streets, I thought they were worthy of a little collage.
How do you fill your Instagram? With polished photographs, pictures of friends from events, full of food, or full of sights that you see on your travels? Is Instagram just another way which we airbrush our lives through social media and indulge in vanity (thinking about doing a little post on this soon) - let me know!
