You are What you Write

"Lives of famous men remind us
As we history's pages turn
That we oftimes leave behind us
Letters that we ought to burn"

I don't know who wrote the above doggerel, I remember reading it and memorizing it when I was in grade school. I suspect it was written in the late 19th or early 20th century.

But I got to thinking about it as I read of people who get into trouble for postings on Facebook. Then there was ex-Congressman Weiner and his infamous tweets.

It used to be that what you wrote was (generally) between you and the person you wrote it to. True, if either of you became famous, and if either of you had saved the correspondence, it could well show up on the best-seller list someday.

But the mass of us (those who 'lead lives of quiet desperation') did not have to worry about our private correspondence becoming public.

Today, we have the Internet. Someone has the ability to capture every keystroke you have ever posted. Your e-mail, your tweets, your texts, your Facebook postings.

100 years from now, you too could be featured in "What were they thinking? -- The postings of the early 21st century" Those will be the totally off-the-wall items that you write.

Some student of gerontology will mine the postings of those of us who grew up without the Internet to see how we adjusted to new technology. Another sociologist will do a thesis on the uninhibited postings of those who never experienced social filters on their lives.

Paper and pen fade in time, deteriorate to illegibility, break down to dust.

But the Internet (we are told) endures forever.