Séamas O’Reilly: There’s nothing for me on Facebook now – except for all the Memories

I’d turned 38 — one of those nothing birthdays that people can’t even pretend means much, but for which I was mildly and pleasantly spoiled.I had a nice night out, some pleasing gifts, and my son made me a card that was so adorable I hesitate to even describe it here in case you’re voluminously sick. (It declared I was “the best dady [sic] in the world”, because what he lacks in spelling, he more than makes up for in taste.)But none of that stuck with me as much as the bip-bip I got from that neglected little app on my phone, signalling that the past was reaching out to me. By past, I mean Facebook itself, which I no longer use on a regular basis. Neither, it seems, do any of my friends, since the notification I received was for the scant three birthday messages waiting for me to peruse; one from a colleague in a job I quit nine years ago, another a schoolfriend’s auntie, and the last from a funk and soul night in Dublin that I followed — but never got round to actually attending — 16 years ago. I hope against hope that the latter was generated automatically
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