I have a Facebook Friend named Jennifer Lee. Well, I had a Facebook friend named Jennifer Lee. I was defriended last week. And now I’m sad.
I don’t know Jennifer Lee. I do know that Jennifer Lee and I have six mutual friends and the “people you may know” bar kept telling me that I may know Jennifer Lee. And after staring at that for weeks, I thought, hmm, maybe I do know Jennifer Lee. I mean we have a lot of the same friends (six) and we both live in Hong Kong. Also, Jennifer Lee is Asian and I know a lot of Asians. And she’s pretty and I know pretty people. So I clicked the “add as friend” button and then forgot about her, probably because it wasn’t important and also because I drank too much bourbon. It was a Tuesday and Tuesday is a good day for bourbon.
On Wednesday I was hungover. But Jennifer Lee was my friend! “Hello New Facebook Friend!” I said to my screen. “I’m David. Your intern. I’ve known you for three months,” my screen said back. I was scared now. A talking screen. This was troubling. “No, over here” the screen said. I looked over. My intern David was staring at me (He’s been my intern for three months but has no mutual friends with Jennifer Lee and me). “Hi David,” I said. “Hello,” he said. “Do you know that I have a talking screen?” I said.
I clicked on Jennifer Lee’s picture and her profile came up. At some point in my life I would have felt creepy about this but now the shame is gone, replaced by an uncanny self-righteousness. She did this to herself I told myself while clicking through photos. She put these up because she wanted to be seen.
In some ways this is true. Jennifer Lee decided to upload lots of pictures to the internet and befriend random dudes who will look at them, especially if they’re labeled “Junk Trip 2011,” as one of her photo albums was. Clicking through this I was interrupted by my coworker. “Do you have the stats for—oh who’s that?” he asked me. “My friend Jennifer Lee,” I said. I asked David to get the stats and we all clicked through some pictures. This was turning into a great Wednesday (except for the hangover).
The next day I forgot about Jennifer Lee. I have a lot of things to do like eat ice cream and watch Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mashup videos so I don’t have that much time for the Jen-nay (that’s my nickname for her. Did I mention we’re friends?). But then through the magic of the Facebook news feed she stayed with me, like those extra 10 pounds it’s so hard to lose.