Feeling the “FOMO”

You’re at a business conference over the weekend. Bored, you pull up your Facebook app and start scrolling through the newsfeed. You run across a picture of your friends enjoying dinner and drinks. They look like they’re having fun, and you feel a twinge of — what is that? Anxiety?

You’ve just experienced the “fear of missing out” or “FOMO.”

Recently, through social media and text-messaging technology, people have popularized the idea of FOMO as an almost-humorous acknowledgement of the fear of missing out on social engagements.

Through July 11, Lakewood artist Erika Jaeggli is hosting a charcoal art exhibit at WAAS Gallery that explores the darker side of “FOMO” — the anxiety and sense of dread that threatens the self, convincing you that you do not really exist if you are not socially engaged.

“We’re always disconnected from someone,” Jaeggli says. “We think of FOMO as a brand new thing, but it’s not. The Greeks were writing about this in tragedy.”

She uses charcoal to give her artwork an “old-timey feel,” she says.

Here is a sampling from the exhibit with a behind-the-scenes look at what Jaeggli had in mind when she created each piece: —Brittany Nunn

This page: “The source material came from all over the place,” Jaeggli says. “I bought postcards on eBay, mostly from Europe mid-century. These people are from a postcard from Berlin. The people weren’t the focus at all [of the postcard], but I loved that she was looking towards us and he wasn’t. I made the background darker and brought them up [into focus].”

Above: “I wanted a really strong picture of a woman looking into the picture,” Jaeggli explains. “Because she’s treated differently than the rest of the background, she serves as a surrogate for the viewer. She’s not really in that world. She’s more in our world, so it’s like we’re looking, too.”

Above: “In all the pieces, there is either someone looking out of the picture or into the picture,” Jaeggli says. “In this one, she’s looking out from the window but not at the viewer. There’s a whole story that’s going on. With the FOMO concept, she’s looking out the window, and she’s inside the picture but not really a part of the picture.”

A tree with her name on it

Claudia Worme is the neighborhood tree hugger, and she doesn’t mind the title one bit.

Worme’s green efforts recently were recognized at the unveiling of Pappy’s Tree Grove, part of the new Alta West Commerce retail and residential development in West Dallas between Trinity Groves and Sylvan Thirty. The grove of 25 mature trees was preserved when developer Wood Partners built the new community around them, rather than bulldozing them and planting new ones.

Wood Partners named the grove for Pappy’s Showland, the post-World War II nightclub formerly at that site, then asked people all over Dallas to nominate greenfriendly advocates to have their name connected to a tree. Melissa Kingston nominated Worme, a fellow Belmont Addition Conservation District resident, because of the great conservation work she does throughout Dallas.

“I’ve known Claudia for a little over 10 years,” Kingston says. “She has always volunteered to do whatever we need in the neighborhood, and one of her passions is trees. When I think about the people who really make an effort to take advantage of the reforestation assets the city makes available and take an interest in replanting our urban forest, she’s the first to come to my mind.”

Worme, who appreciates Wood Partners’ efforts to save the trees and feels “honored” to be one of the 15 names recognized in the grove, became a tree ad- vocate while taking a mid-career sabbatical from her corporate job with Warner Brothers.

Starting in 2003, she threw herself into volunteering with organizations such as For the Love of the Lake, Preservation Dallas, White Rock Lake Conservancy and the White Rock Lake Task Force.

“I love this part of town and what it has to offer,” Worme says. “The reason I got involved in reforestation is because of White Rock Lake, and it being fairly untouched. The trees are very old and we’ve got to plant new ones so that — I know this sounds corny — so that future generations will have trees to enjoy at the lake.”

“The trees are very old and we’ve got to plant new ones so that — I know this sounds corny so that future generations will have trees to enjoy at the lake.”

Worme’s volunteer efforts aren’t limited strictly to reforestation. During her sabbatical, she also volunteered to help with events, including the Belmont Addition’s porch crawl and research for Preservation Dallas’ database of historic buildings and neighborhoods.

This is not the first time Worme has been recognized for her work, either. In 2006, For the Love of the Lake named her volunteer of the year.

After spending the better part of a decade focusing her energy on volunteerism and tree advocacy, Worme has returned to her day job. Although she doesn’t have as much time to volunteer, she’s still passionate about reforestation.

“I still do my neighborhood stuff,” she says. —Brittany Nunn