In which my grandfather’s ghost pays a visit to Facebook

My aunt Karen, who’s on Facebook, recently changed her profile pic to an old photo of my grandfather. It’s apparently one of those fun little things that’s going around the web: “In honor of 2011 Father’s Day, change your profile picture to a picture of your father and keep it there till June 20, 2011.”

I didn’t know this was a thing, which is why I was so surprised the other day when I happened to glance at my “Friends on Chat” panel – and there, in a space no bigger than a cubic centimetre, was my smiling grandfather.

You know that moment between the point when you recognize something familiar, like the face of a loved one who’s no longer with you, and the point at which your brain kicks in and processes what you’re seeing? Well, just for a second, during the moment between those two mental bookends, I thought I’d been given the chance to chat online with my dead grandfather.

Obviously, that wasn’t the case. But telling my aunt about it later gave us a chance to look back on her father, and my grandfather, and how awesome it would be to spend Father’s Day having another conversation with him. Also, as much as I hate to admit it, I did get a kick out of the mental image of my grandfather sitting at a computer, trying in vain to figure out “how in the hell this damned Facebook” works.

In the end, at the risk of getting mushy, it was an opportunity to think about my grandfather and the role he filled in our lives. That was the point of the Facebook campaign, and surely it’s the point of Father’s Day. And if it gave you one more excuse to think about the fathers in your life, then so much the better.

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