Facebooked Lives

 

It’s been an entire week since I posted anything on my Facebook timeline. My wall looks sullen. Gives me dirty looks whenever I go online. I need to yank the dust covers off my life and get some decent pictures out in the next few days. And I need to come up with something new…something pretty…and something witty to go with the pretty … little flags that declare how awesome I am, and how well I have my entire life under control.

Just look at what my friends are doing – there’s Sheena who’s posted pictures of her bungee-jumping in Alaska, for god’s sake… and Rohini, who went all the way to Goa to get married, and plastered her wall with gorgeous pictures of the ceremony against a mind-boggling sunset… and Meera, who pops up all over social media with yet one more award for her latest documentary. I could go on and on. Seriously, they’re all doing something exciting; something fun.

And here I am on a horribly warm Monday morning, inching my way to office through peak-hour traffic, with an irate auto driver as my companion. Wait a minute - his moustache does look out of the ordinary. Perhaps I could quietly take a photograph and then post it on my wall with a witty comment. On second thoughts, that may not be a good idea… what if he sues me for online harassment?

Perhaps I should seriously consider dating Sudhir. That guy has been dropping hints for a while now. And I must admit, he photographs rather well. Will sit quite prettily on my wall. Me clinging to his arm, with the Lonavla lake in the backdrop…I could even sneak in the Lake Isle of Innisfree into the caption. Sounds colorful, na? So what if my conversations with him don’t go beyond five minutes? Thankfully, Facebook doesn’t require him to talk. But then, I do. And oh dear god, I’ll need to put up with his endless bragging…besides, once we’re up on Facebook, I can’t even dump him before a decent interval. That won’t show me up in very good light. That’s just too much bother, for a few good pics on your wall, don’t you think? 

But, what else can I do? I know…I’ll sign up for that month-long pottery class. Hopefully, at the end of it, I would have turned out some classy pots and dishes, that I could showcase on Facebook.

One second…I think that’s my phone…. Hey, Maria, where have you been all these days? So, what’s new? What about Rohini? No, I haven’t. What??? But she just got married!!! Poor thing….

So, then, Rohini’s marriage is over. God, she’ll need to take down all those gorgeous photographs on Facebook. Perhaps she’d do well to shut down her current account and open a new one. Like Tara did last month. Would be nice if Facebook had an in-built mechanism to help you sail through the times when life is doing the 'tossed upon stormy seas' routine on you.

Come to think of it, Facebook owes it to us, don’t you think? I mean, after all, a spectacle should always be worth looking at. Think of it. In any case, Facebook knows pretty much all that’s happening in our lives. So the moment it realizes you’ve had a break-up, it could pull up a suitable photograph from your albums, Photoshop it to show you against an exotic yet brooding landscape, and play melancholy music in the background when someone clicks on it.

Now, that would be something. Living the life Facebook built for us – way simpler than Facebooking our actual lives, if you ask me.