Yes, my father, who still isn’t straight on which hamburger chain sells Big Macs and which sells Whoppers, has joined Facebook.
Yea, verily, Dad is on Facebook. The End Times are upon us. Dad’s arrival on Facebook has been accompanied by a rending of the earth and the heavens, the march of armies of darkness, plagues of twelve kinds, and the ravishing of the land by demons summoned from beyond lost time and shadow. The ocean is as blood, the sky as ash, and the land is torn asunder. Judgment shall rain down upon all of the damned, and things long ago foretold shall come to pass. For Dad is on Facebook.
And then I thought about my dad who’s been gone for 4 years now. That made me think how much I miss him and wish he’d been on Facebook at some point. Then I thought, I’d better not post what I’m thinking.
And then I thought, no go ahead and post; Rick needs to know that he should enjoy his old man’s attempt at being hep and cool and all that. Enjoy it while you can Rick.
My Mom joined last night. It seems my niece is staying out there for the week helping out with yardwork (earn a couple bucks from the grandparents over summer vacation) and showed her how. At the rate she’s going, she’ll have more friends than me by tomorrow.
I am better than average at predicting world changing technology and Facebook is one of those. Both of my parents who are in their 60’s are on it. That isn’t surprising because they certainly aren’t dumb or tech shy but it has shrunk the world. I live 2000 miles away from them and I log into Facebook from my Boston office at work sometimes like today and they are both on there. They haven’t been married married since 1987 and live 300 miles apart themselves yet there is both faces staring right at me ready to chat at will.
Even ignoring normal privacy concerns, I basically know where they are and when they log in and off just by watching the screen change without any effort on my part and I am sure they can do the same. It is more than a little freaky. I moved away from my home town forever when I was 18 but I have found myself caught up in a perpetual high school reunion since I joined. You could technically do these things before FaceBook but, like most technology, it is all about accessibility and the user interface.
My mom’s been on Facebook for some time. Sometimes she even posts.
Keeps me honest. (We relate to each other pretty openly, though, so she’s pretty used to seeing me swearing/posting articles about radical sex-positive queer activism or whatever.)
My parents still prefer PetVille. I even let them set up one for me. I just told them that they’d have to log in as me and use it, because I wouldn’t. With my addictive personality, I refuse to get started playing these games.
Also, I make sure they use Adblock, and have locked down their profiles (after asking, of course). That takes most of the bad stuff out.
The worst thing my mom does is reply to someone else’s wall post when she’s trying to talk to me. And then it’s just to say “I love you!”
That’s always the worst. Not generally because its your parents, but really anyone that has no connections to your friends trying to friend them due to the mutual connection (you). Weirds me out.
I had a very traumatic night last night when i got a friend request from my stepmom.
Now, I love my stepmom but the rest of my family (3 older brothers and wives and spawn) refuse to acknowledge she’s any relation to them, especially now that my dad has passed. She will always be The Other Woman.
I, of course, being a grown up, accepted her friendship request. I just wonder how long it will be before the sh*t storm hails down upon me from my family.
My mom died 17 years ago so she never had a chance to explore the internet. I think she’d have loved it. Especially Facebook. My daughter and I carry on all the time posting silly stuff on each other’s wall. I hope she doesn’t mind me being there! I’ve never even thought it might be an embarrassment for her.
My mom is on Facebook, but I would not friend her. I just did not see what good could possibly come of that. One of my sisters did and whenever I see what and how my mom has closen to write on my sister’s wall, I know I made the right choice.
Ha! Yeah when I got a friend request from my mom I wrote her “No, Mom”. I have a friend whose mom comments on her every post, and now has scared off everyone else.
