My Facebook Movie

My Facebook Movie was exciting. At one point there was a picture of a drainpipe. I'd taken it whilst in the middle of repairing it, partly as a record and partly to show my dad, should it prove too difficult to complete. My Dad's a big man, used to working with his hands and feels more at home with inanimate objects than he does with people, he'd have loved the movie. The gentle but simple piano that played in the background was an inspired touch and gave real gravitas to this monumental juncture from my hectic online life. 2008, it seemed, had been a fun filled year.

Many of the other pictures threw me. The people were randomly selected, firstly by myself in some unusual display of online bonhomie back in 2011 and then secondly by a Facebook algorithm that seemed intent upon rewriting my own history. These people smiled and made comments about my son's painting or the witty message I wrote on a car windscreen covered in snow, but they were minor players in my life, not even bit-part actors and yet, through the power of code, the binary dance of zeros and ones, they were given top billing in a film that wouldn't even receive a DVD release.

I sagged, both physically and emotionally. I was a sack of a man. My life from 2007 to now was nothing more than out of focus pictures of half-remembered nights out and 'thumbs up' from people I didn't even know. It was like watching a relative's holiday video, I tried to look interested, but my heart just wasn't in it, even though I was.

I paused over the 'Share' button. It was one thing to discover that I was less than zero but did I really want everyone else in on the secret?

I viewed other people's movies, only a few; even I, the dullest man from 2007-2014, had a limit, but what I saw gave me heart. I wasn't alone. These people were no better than me, they were no more exciting, or invigorating, their pictures just as mundane and out of focus as mine, some even worse, their posts no more profound or 'liked' than mine and all of them linked by the same shitty piece of piano.

I picked myself up, straight back, deep breath and pressed 'share.' Come on you dull bastards, let's be having you.