Twitter is Haggis

Twitter is haggis.  It really is.  It was a haggis of a place when I landed in 2007.  And to some extent, it still is a haggis of a place –a sack of many kinds of ingredients, trying each of their best to co-habitate and mingle with the intent that someone out there will enjoy the haggis as a whole.  Or in the ambitions of a few, to stand out as a favourite spice or part.

From the sheep intestine that twitter.com is to the organs that are the constant newsfeed posted by @BreakingNews and others to the blood and gravy that are the repetitions of ‘social media experts,’ and finally to the spices and suet made up of all the characters whom I follow whose tweets vary widely from topics like gay rights to announcements of new car purchases from Bentley Motor Cars.  Absolutely a haggis!

You just never know what you’re gonna get.  I like that uncertainty. I’m sure many of my Twitter friends stick around because of the zeal for that uncertainty, too.  Some of them want flavour in their lives!

As if I we didn’t have enough of it in our own worlds book-ended by hypertension medication refills and homeowners association payments.  We still cling to being a part of the peanut gallery in others’ uncertainty.  Nonetheless, it’s all still an uncertainty.  We enjoy it.  We enjoy the haggis.

But like with a hearty haggis, the twitterverse will find itself an unwanted crunch here and there.  And sometimes a downright unappetizing piece of innard that just doesn’t deserve to sit on the shiny side of flatware will appear.  We’re experts –we, the twitter collective –at the haggis, so we rebury it in our simmering offal and our dish continues to develop while we hope that the offending piece simmers away to a chewable texture.  But sometimes that something foul never boils down and it falls on a particular spice or ingredient to tackle that cibus non grata.

I think I’m the pepper in haggis.  I’m wry (dry, really), very flaky and extremely versatile –I can enhance savoury but also tickle the senses on the sweet, too.  More importantly, I’m resolute in my spiciness.  It’s difficult for me or anyone else to apologize for the flavour I bring.  Some folks love pepper, others really dislike it.  But for most, there’s hardly ever a notice that pepper is even mixed in.  That is, of course, until pepper is completely gone.  Then the wondering begins about what pepper really does to affect the pot and how it bring flavours out from so many other ingredients.  Pepper brings a little earthiness to everything, but never takes itself too seriously.  That, of course, is salt’s job.  I’m pepper; I digress.

Yesterday I came across a tweet, which was a reply to what I thought was an awfully presumptuous tweet:  “How unqualified do you have to be that the only job you can get is working at a mall kiosk?” The reply (which I found first) retorted: “Sorry [...] at least that person is working rather than being a burden – nothing wrong w/ being gainfully employed.” So in my pepper duties, I tweeted ‘Hear, Hear!’ –unequivocal in my support for the retort.

I added my spice.  The haggis was supposed to continue stewing.  But the reply I received after my interjection was akin to a gelatinous piece un-gluing from the suet.  Based on the reply I received, it felt like that iceberg of tallow was going rogue.  It began to try things not suitable for haggis.  Its oiliness was about to throw off the balance of the stock.

The  initial reply: “The [grump] in me is annoyed for not being able to walk through the mall [without] being bothered every 20′ by a kiosk seller….” Ahh, I misinterpreted the original tweet; Or so I thought.  And to signify my so desu ne, I replied “LOL yes, I’m not a fan of that. Have not been to a mall on purpose in quite some time anyway.”

Things would return to normal; we were cooking the haggis again.  Until more greasiness of the rogue former-suet began to spread.

“…but I would not call that ‘gainful employment’” was thrown back at me.  I am adept at making light of situations even while pursuing my endgame.  So I took a stab:  “well, Congress itself can’t decide what “gainful employ” means since many believe it [should] be defined against the economy at-hand.” And yet another stab, “but if I use [the Social Security Administration's] definition, [people] *ARE* gainfully employed if they make at least $1,000/month if not blind.”

Out of nowhere, a friendly comment was made that –I thought –helped move the discussion even lighter.  “[Malls] have become like the ancient markets of the old silk road.  [In] your face, cutthroat competition.  [I] kinda like it.”

Ingredients, it seemed, still believed the haggis could be saved.  A noble but later-ineffective reinforcement of stray vein came out of nowhere to try to lasso that fatty spoiler, but ‘veiny’s’ efforts were in vain.

There was no winning or losing; this was just a friendly game of “I really want to know what you meant.”  But before I took any further steps, I was a little shocked:  “I made more than a $1k a month [in] high school. If you can’t make $1k a month, you aren’t trying hard enough.” That’s what was sent to me.  Ahh, good snapshot into someone’s thinking I thought.  So I engaged; “Some of us didn’t work in [high school] but I [could never] presume to say what a [comfortable] income is for ANYone, no [matter what] I need to ‘survive.’” It continued.  I was hit with another reply; this time:  “my materialistic needs outweigh my desire to be lazy hence I could never be one of those people who take advantage of the system.” But then I felt I had to explain further:  “[I'm] not even a democrat (I know, laugh :p) yet i still don’t assume EVERYone making under a certain [dollar amount] is taking [benefits from the system.]“

Greasy or not, the haggis continued to cook.  Other ingredients were oblivious to the excessive greasiness.  But I figured I’d take the subordinating role I signed-up for as pepper and let the dish fix itself.

It made sense to me to simply kill the conversation even if additional replies came my way.  I ended with “I’m sure we could wax on bout our philosophies of employ,  but I was making a [point] that: I can’t presume who’s job is [better or worse than] my own [requirements.]“ There were no other replies.  But I got a very clear picture of an individual’s values.

‘Making nice’ is an indelible and noticeable trait among Hawaii residents, and today’s discussion would not have been complete without that.  Though, it came from an unrelated onlooker; “sounds like a topic we should discuss over martinis and lap dances… i smell tweet up! lol”

So in a last ditch effort, a yard of Guinness offered itself as a reward for a fine accompaniment to a haggis that really could still be saved.  But alas, that offer came and went.  The grease still slicked the surface.  What ingredients did notice the ruckus went back to their simmering stations and the others that didn’t continued to add their own flavour, almost on-schedule and completely oblivious.

I chalked-up the experience as a learning one.  Twitter provides opportunities to learn on so many levels, and from so many opportunities; This was no different.  Some experiences are long, tough, and chewy.  Others, instead are small, delicious, and excite the senses. What we –as users of Twitter –get, though, are opportunities not just to learn or draw experiences, but simply to re-mingle, and to join the crowd once again on your own terms.

We, that same collective that is the haggis, continue to cook just hoping for more ingredients to balance the greasiness from today or the blandness that might be tomorrow, but we continue to cook.  Every now and then, a kind cook will skim the top to increase our potency or will split the batch to let us develop in our own pots.

Whether that ingredient is me, you, or someone else; Or that cook is me, you, or another someone else:  We continue to make the haggis.  And me, you, someone else, or we return whenever we are hungry.

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