the aestheticism of being chronically online

There’s something oddly embarrassing about being too online. You notice it when someone replies too fast, references a meme that already feels expired, or speaks in internet slang like it’s a second language. The assumption is that they have nothing better to do. No real life to escape to. But what if this version of reality, this constant stream of language and visuals and commentary, isn’t as shallow as people make it seem?

In my opinion, what makes these little references to defining is how they've seemed to gain an identity of their own through "meaningless" connections. Previous generations weren't given the privilege of connecting through a scrap of media consumed that, by the algorithm gods, has been chosen as consequential. This privilege is the essence of our generation. The previous generations didn't have the commodity of understanding a person through their liked content intake or their references being thrown. We do. This changes everything. Human connection on a deeper, philosophical level has been refurbished by our ability to draw a conclusion on whether or not we wish to engage with a person based on such superficial contrivances.

There is a certain accidental elegance to being chronically online. Not the loud kind. Not performance disguised as personality. But something quieter, more subconscious. Over time, constant exposure to fragments of imagery, text, sound, and thought begins to shape an inner eye. You learn to sense tone in silence, to assemble meaning from suggestion, and to recognize beauty in things that pass too quickly to be named. The feed becomes less a distraction and more a kind of unsought education in composition. You begin to see light the way it falls in photo dumps. You notice how words land when stripped of punctuation. Your sense of timing is sharpened by short-form rhythm, and your aesthetic vocabulary is expanded by a thousand uncredited references. None of this is deliberate, but it accumulates. It alters how you see. It teaches you to look closely, even if you're looking through a screen. And while nothing replaces presence, there’s something undeniably intricate about the way online life reshapes perception. Not better. Not worse. Just different. And maybe, in its own way, a little bit beautiful.