Celia’s Head :  Writing must come first. I have to be blunt. You won’t listen otherwise. You’re spending far too long every morning doing other things: clicking a few likes on Stumbleupon, Re-Tweeting your faves, catching up with discussions on LinkedIn, sharing on Facebook etc. etc. You should be writing.

Celia’s Heart : But social networking is important. Everybody says so.

Head: Who’s everybody?

Heart: Everybody on Twitter. If you don’t follow etiquette, something terrible will happen. And if you don’t Stumble regularly . .

 

Head: Don’t be ridiculous.

Heart: It’s true. You could get yourself black-balled or even ex-communicated. You’d be a pariah, a sinner, an undesirable.

Head: You’re being silly.

Heart: They are jealous gods, Head. You must pay homage. Worship every day. It’s a bit like writing, only different.

Head: I think you need a rest, Heart. You don’t sound yourself. Jealous gods, indeed.

Heart: They are. You must make regular sacrifices or they will bring down the wrath of the virtual heavens.  They know where you are. They know everything about you. Erich Schmidt said so just the other day. They know where you’ve been, what films you like. Everything.

Head: That’s because you’ve told them. You’ve Stumbled and Tweeted and Shared. You’ve spilled your guts, Heart. Of course they know everything about you. But this hand of God thing is going a bit far. Excommunicated? Grow up.

Heart: But it’s part of my life now, Head. What would I do without it?

Head: You know who you sound like, don’t you?

Heart: Who?

Head: Gollum Boy. You’re just the same, Heart. You’re addicted. You’ve turned into Gollum Woman.

Heart: But, it’s the way of the world now, Head. There’s no getting away from it. We can’t un-invent all these communication channels. You have to be in them. You must take part. You’re either with me or against me, Head. We’ll stand a better chance together – strength in unity and all that. You have to keep up. You can’t risk being dis-favoured with a thumbs down on Stumble or worse, Unfollowed on Twitter. Don’t you want to influence discussions on LinkedIn? You want to be known as a writer as much as I do, don’t you? You won’t stand a chance unless you’re being seen. Your name has got to be out there. You can’t risk excommunication. You’d be in the wilderness . . .

Head: Have you heard yourself?

Heart: . . . and your writing would be buried forever under a pile of essays about horizontal deadbolts. Buried alive you’d be, dead to the world, and all the while you’d be screaming to be heard, hammering against your prison walls to be let out into the Googlesphere and into the alms of our benefactor, the noble Erich.

But nobody would want to hear you.

Head: Would you like me to make you a nice cup of tea, dear?

Heart: It’s coming, you know. The new Trinity. The noble Erich and King Mike of Walmart will be joined by the god of Amazon. And if I knew how to do smart things with images in WordPress, I’d have these three photos conjoined like a triptych, you know, the sort of thing you see on an altar.

Head: What? Walmart, Amazon and Google? WAG?

Heart: You heard it here first.

Head: I’ll go and put the kettle on.