Facebook - everyone's doing it!

If you're reading a blog, you've surely at least heard of Facebook by now. I joined Facebook a few months ago when an old friend emailed to let me know lots of people from our school in Dusseldorf were on Facebook, and it is free and took about 3 minutes to join, so I did. I spent about a day and half absorbed by it, and now I just check in once in awhile. There are all sorts of applications you can add to your Facebook page, especially innane little quizzes like: Which Disney princess are you? Which Jane Austin character are you? What accent do you have? etc. You can add little dodads where people can "buy you a drink" or hug you or etc. You can add some game Scrabbalous that has a huge icon that irritates everyone you're friends with when it shows up on their update screen, although it is probably fun. I haven't really gotten into all that.

But Facebook is a perfect way to catch up with old friends, especially really old casual friends that you are curious about, but it would seem a little too much to email or call them. Being friends on Facebook, as far as I can tell, is a pretty low maintenance relationship. You glance through their page, see where they're living and where they went to school, if they're married or have kids, maybe leave a little note "Hi! Great to see you're doing well!" Perfect. If you're between 25 and 35, everyone you knew way back when is on Facebook, and it's more true every day. Among my Facebook friends are my first kiss, the missionary who baptised me, college friends, cousins, people I vaguely knew in high school, and a few people I am still good friends with. No, you'll just have to guess who my first kiss was, I won't tell :) As far as I can tell Facebook is mostly for old, but not too old, people like me. The young women at church are all on MySpace.

The best thing about Facebook is that you get to see how amazingly well some people are doing. I've sort of gotten used to the idea that I am an adult, but I can't tell you how surprising it is to see that the little blond kid Charlie from second grade is now a hulking blond man! Or the girl I sat next to in 9th grade geometry who - I want to say this nicely - did not really run with the cool crowd (hence I sat next to her...), well now she's like the archetypal GenXer, with snazzy Ivy League law degrees, living in NYC working for an international law firm, travelling all over with her hipster friends partying and having a great time. My old friend from elementary school who is beautiful, with an Ivy league MBA, working for a hot shot consulting firm also in NYC. Or just seeing that an old middle school friend just had twins. It is all really great to see.

So you should join Facebook too. It's fun! And we can be friends! (The only people who can see your Facebook profile are people you add as "friends," and although you're supposed to use your real name, you can put as much or as little information up as you want.)