Area Man “Basically” Off the Grid

By Harry Weinstein

Nov. 2, 2018

Claiming that he lives independently from social media these days, 39 year-old local resident Matt Dewey said it’s been “pretty freeing to just be here, in the now—and not have deal with all this stuff from a fake ‘virtual’ world.” Dewey now never changes any profile pictures and admits to spending only six hours scrolling through Facebook photos and articles a day. 

Whenever relatives and friends ask him why he never updates his status or photos, which “believe me, happens all the time,” he says, he has to explain that he’s just given up that vacuous part of his life.

“Like, for instance, last week it was my little cousin’s birthday. And she called the next day and said she was really hurt I didn’t post anything for her birthday, even though she saw a green light was next to my name from 6 p.m. till about midnight. I told her I’m off the grid, but it seemed like that wasn’t enough for her. I mean, people just don’t get it these days. They’re all so glued to their screens, as if it’s reality or something.”

As the reporter left his home, Matt was answering the door to someone from Postmates carrying a huge bag of Arby’s. His new charcoal-grey MacBook Pro was open to an album of his high-school ex-girlfriend’s trip to Florence. He said if he scrolled hard enough he could get to the pictures of his estranged brother’s wedding, which he wasn’t invited to.

“It’s pretty fun,” he said, as he walked me out his log-cabin to a long dark wooden pathway. “That’s how I spend most of my Saturday nights.”

Wow. Truly a man of the past.