A few nights ago, I was scrolling TikTok when I stumbled on a livestream featuring a pile of popcorn accompanied by the music of Elton John. A disembodied hand held a heated hair styling tool clamping a single kernel. How stupid, I thought, am I just supposed to sit here and wait for the corn to pop? But I enjoy Elton John, so I stayed.
After a couple of minutes, the kernel popped, and the hand tossed it into to the heap of popcorn bathing in purple disco light. I decided to stay for one more. I’d come in mid-process and therefore didn’t get an accurate representation of how long it takes from start to finish for a flat iron to pop a piece of corn. This was for science, and the correct answer is the entirety of “Benny and the Jets” plus half of “Tiny Dancer.”
There were 1200 people watching the stream. That many people have nothing better to do. I was suffering from a bout of insomnia. What was their excuse? I read the viewer comments scrolling the bottom of the screen:
Wtf is this?
Why are 1200 people watching popcorn pop? LOL
Y’all need to go outside and touch grass.
The fact that I’d just completed these same thoughts no longer seemed to apply. I was one of them, the people watching a flat iron slowly pop corn, a kernel at a time. I began to feel a bit defensive as a spectator who’d invested time in the sport.
TikTok’s algorithm is incredibly sophisticated. It’s been said that it knows you better than you know yourself. I realize our every digital move is monitored and tracked, but I still don’t understand how, when I first signed up, the app seemed to know I was going through a breakup. I was inundated with videos of therapists offering gentle advice, permission to grieve, and tools to cope. Then, TikTok began accusing my ex-boyfriend of being a narcissist and suggested my people-pleasing tendencies were a way to protect unhealed wounds by controlling others , and maybe I’m not really as nice as I think I am.
Next came a caravan of tarot readers—videos with hundreds of thousands of views—meanwhile the psychics insisted the reading had been intended to “resonate” specifically with me. Every single of one them predicted eventual reconciliation with “someone from the past.”
“Yes,” they nodded, pulling The Fool from the deck, “the man you just thought of.”
How cruel, I thought, to capitalize on the vulnerable and brokenhearted, many of whom are likely desperate enough to believe…Wait, did she say the man has brown eyes and his name starts with J?
I don’t know which happened first, if I healed or if TikTok decided it was time for me to move on, but the therapists and the tarot readers stopped showing up on my For You Page, the endless, evolving feed of videos curated by TikTok’s magic algorithm to suit the user’s specific interests. In swooped a flight of meditation videos to the rescue, along with instructions for breath work, and yoga techniques to help release stored trauma. I’d leveled up. I learned how to regulate my nervous system, something I previously hadn’t known was possible.
I take responsibility for encouraging my feed to prescribe heavy doses of dog content, which TikTok creators generously provide. Those help to fill the void when it’s my ex’s turn to have custody of our dog. Days on which Noodle the pug would have declared “No Bones.” If you know, you know.
A year ago, shortly after the breakup and moving out of our home, I returned from a walk during which I’d found a hawk feather directly in my path. Figuring the bird was done using it, I took it home. I washed the feather carefully, set it to dry, and rewarded myself for getting some exercise by opening the app. First video up, a woman stared into the lens, held up a nearly identical feather and said, “Hawk feather. You will find one of these soon.”
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