My Friends

I just made a Facebook friend.

For the most part there is nothing particularly interesting about that. In my case it is unusual, though. In fact, it is unique.

I didn't create my own Facebook account. A close (but often annoying) friend spoofed me, and she knew enough about me to get my password right (meaning I could guess it).

I wasn't the only one who could guess it. Another friend (that proves I have at least two, but not on Facebook) logged on in my name, and randomly befriended a bunch of people before I snatched the iPad out of his hand. He was taunting me. He wouldn't have bothered without some potential for me to discover his misdemeanour.

I never checked my Facebook account, but I didn't delete it (I assume that's possible). I found it came in handy. The smart bastards that built this insidious system hold out access to some parts of Facebook when you are not logged in. And I wanted to know Mona stuff.

A couple of years ago I went to a wedding dinner. My newly nuptialized mates told me what time the dinner was because I didn't commune electronically. Everybody else was told on Facebook. They all turned up an hour late because the time specified on Facebook was wrong. I sat with the bride and groom for an hour, a self-oiling third wheel. It was rather pleasant. But also rather edifying. I discovered that everyone I knew was on Facebook.

Occasionally, very occasionally, it crossed my mind that trying hard not to be like everybody else doesn't really work. It seems okay to be a rugged individualist, but communication, honest communication, isn't just an extension of your own consciousness. It also extends someone else's. You and they, that's the definition of need. No one benefits from being themselves alone.

An ex-girlfriend had a new partner. Some time ago she thought he might be a danger to himself. But, actually, I knew him better than her. He was part of my family. And he wasn't a danger to anyone. In fact, he was kind of lovely. So I ignored her.

Just now, wondering if I failed him, wondering if I’d failed his family, wondering if I'd failed our mutual-ex, I checked my friend requests.

There were 263 of them. Many, perhaps most, were people by the name of David Walsh, and they were recommended by David Walsh. Do people think that coincidental characters, in a coincidental order make one compatible? Does coincidence define character?

But there were people in that list that I like, and love, that I've hardly communicated with for years. And some that I've spent some time with recently, and maybe they don't know my Facebook habits (which might be the habits of a lifetime) and they think I've spurned them. Maybe not taking the time to care, maybe not being suckered into a medium or process that everyone is a part of, maybe that's what spurning is. Maybe, sometimes, you have to sell out to the shysters, to keep your integrity, to maintain your shit.

One of those 263 requests was, as I expected, from Aled Garlick. He was the brother of a man who is my brother’s son, but is nearly my son, because it isn't just biology that makes one a son. But Aled was not my nephew, because my brother died too soon to be his father. He is the son of two people that have other sons, and a daughter, but he will not be less missed because he is not all they have. And he will not be less missed because they have lost before, and because they didn't understand then, and cannot understand now.

He is, too late, my first Facebook friend.

Graffiti wall at Mona's Moonah office

Aled Garlick, 2012