Do I care?

The look on my twelve year old daughter's friend's face when I replied to her question if I was watching 'I'm a celebrity get me out of here!' was priceless if it wasn't so shocking: Sheer incredulity that someone she knew was not watching it was all over her expressive face.

But it seems I cannot avoid knowing what is going on in the jungle: My alarm goes off and I am immediately told by the news presenter about the latest shenanigans. The front page of the newspaper has an image of a politician, preparing to enter the camp. As I scroll through Facebook, I am invited to click numerous times to find out the real reason why someone has left the show already.

Whilst it might seem totally harmless and just a bit of fun, it is also frightening that my most precious commodity - my brain - is being so sought after, to engage with such 'mindless drivel' as my dad would have said.

It is now an almost constant conscious decision to keep my attention on what I want it to be on.

I pick up my phone to make a phone call, and Google feels it is appropriate to interrupt my chain of thought to notify me that somebody I have never heard of has announced the name of their baby on Instagram.

I hope this does not come across as callous when I say: I. Really. Don't. Care.

I care about making a positive difference to our world. I care about the people I know. I care about people I don't know who are facing head on the world's emergencies that I read about (after flicking through the first few headline grabbing pages of the newspaper).

I care about what I choose to turn my attention to, which builds and fills my day. I never would have thought it would be such a daily battle.