I’m convinced Facebook is bi-polar, whether by design or because of some unexpected side effect of a social experiment. This place is brimming with people who didn’t have many friends growing up or who had so many, they had to let everyone know.

Of course I'm over-simplifying. Like all social gatherings, lots of types frequent Facebook.

While I think it’s sort of narcissistic to post my day by day musings and menial activities, I like the feedback. It’s also kind of sweet to thumbs up Lisa because she didn't burn her Lasagna last night. Lisa offers me her unspoken thanks when she “Likes” that I had a great time at the movies.  Not a bad way to give and get an instant cyber pat without having to be on the phone for an hour.

We're all so busy and yet we micro connect in places like Facebook. And oddly these morsels of instant connection feel good.

Before Facebook I used to refer to people who called each other hour by hour, “toilet paper” friends. This was my description of women who called their friends ten times a day, maybe just to tell them they bought a particular brand of toilet paper on sale. As a stay at home mother, I needed to reach outside the lonely moments and Barney songs as much as the next mom, but I never really understood the draw of that much moment by moment communication. But hey, if it’s a win-win who am I to care.

I suspect part of the popularity of Facebook is our society has become increasingly splintered. Decades back women entered the workplace and neighborhoods were less habitated during the day. Instant messaging has replaced hand written thank you notes, front porch visits and local picnics. Fewer extended families exist and no one is really doing Neighborhood Watch. Trying to find people like us who genuinely care has become an almost subconscious primal need.

Facebook is this social cyber cocktail party and a pretty weird place to hang out if you think about it. You haven't seen “Carol” since the eighties and you never liked her back then, but on Facebook you know more about her than your next door neighbor Mike who you’ve waved to every day for the last ten years.

Whether it’s who gets the most "Likes," who replied to who, who has the most "Friends," the peer measures on Facebook are an ongoing adult popularity contest no one ever wins. I’m pretty sure I only have sixty or so Friends; I just don't want to pressure anyone who knows me about as well as my drycleaner.

I don’t have lines of people pounding on my Facebook page. But every so often someone really nice Friends me and it’s a pleasant surprise. For people I prefer not to show my personal photos and daily newsfeed, I politely ignore. No need to be rude; I just pretend I never got the invite.

Six months ago I told a few friends I was far too busy to sign up for “that Facebook thing,” now I’m on it three or more times a day. I don’t play games like Bejeweled or answer surveys like "what kind of dog are you?" But give it time, I'll buckle.

Whatever Facebook means for each of us seems to reflect a side of who we are, and maybe for some, who we want to be. It’s an image maker with a controlled stage we can manipulate to our liking. As a former psychology major and someone who loves social psych, I’m endlessly fascinated by this online chatter box.

Last summer I commented to my friend Angie how interesting it is that some people unabashedly show off their life to a populous of people sitting behind a screen, and in some cases, people they've never met. “How someone behaves on Facebook,” Angie suggested, “is probably not that different than how they are at a party, at work, or at the grocery store. Prentenious in person, prententious online.”

Facebook has sucked me into the vortex in the same addictive fashion email did fifteen years ago. I like the quick “Atta girl” I can give and receive. I like seeing pictures of my friends or reading that Denise enjoyed eating at a restaurant I  always wanted to try. Phone calls take too long, and emails lack tone and a sense of interactive community.   And while I left my maiden name off because I’d never get any writing done with all that reminiscing with former classmates, the reunions are probably genuinely exciting for some people and deeply cathartic for others.

Like all social media, Facebook is a communications force we can use for great good or mild evil. A dose of inspiration, a nice comment from a friend after we’ve had a crappy day, it's like a cyber Hallmark and a form of streaming validation, something we all crave.

How we choose to use our power of social acknowledgement with our friends, or with our “Friends,” amounts to how we choose to treat anyone in any social venue: we can interact with people the way we would like them to interact with us, or we can remain the mean kid in high school or the pretentious party guest. Either way, this cyber front porch is yours to use.