It’s Your Facebook Friend’s Birthday and he’s Dead
Thanks, Facebook, for ruining my day.
Yeah, this is a new thing. Generations past never had to face this particularly bizarre challenge. My dead Facebook friend’s birthday has arrived, and I get a notification. “It’s Danny Canton’s birthday. Send him a message.”
No, we weren’t close. I haven’t seen him Danny Canton since high school. But there he is, dead on my Facebook. And I have been made to ponder things…too deeply.
What kind of message am I supposed to send a dead guy? “Happy birthday, dude, hope you’re skiing those slopes up in heaven?”
I remembered that Canton was on the ski team. I didn’t remember much else about him. I did hear he died in an avalanche in Colorado about five years back.
Depressing.
I don’t like this feeling of powerlessness. I mean, usually I know how to respond to Facebook posts. Like! Or thumbs up! Or every once in a while: heart.
But death…I got nothing for that.
Why don’t I simply unfriend him, you ask? Well, that feels super creepy, unfriending and unfollowing the dead. I’m not superstitious, but I don’t want a dead person getting mad at me. It’s a problem. The dead are haunting our social media selves.
