Signs Signs Everywhere A Sign

So, getting back to the helpful article about what we do that makes our men so crazy and that they go to bed each night praying on their hands and knees that we'd stop doing, yes, Facebook was like a third guest at the table set for two.  There is what goes on between the two of you, and then there is the Facebook image of what goes on between the two of you.

And that can be manipulated.

And it was. In this case and in others. More on that below, But for now, back to the article.

Aside from us insisting that our men tell the world of Facebook formally that we are in a relationship (which sounds ridiculous even as I write it) we also expect validation on Facebook. 

And I am gasping in horror.

I do this. I know I do.

I am actually miffed when Craig likes some woman's post or comments on her picture and does not give me the same props when I do similarly. 

I wonder about the intent and I wonder about what impression it has made.

Is he giving the other girl Facebook attention in the same way he did with me way back when we were first flirting?  Is he not remarking on my post because he does not want anyone to think he's interested in me? (since it tends to get all interested parties" tongues wagging) Or is it that he doesn't have to use FB to flirt with me, he can do that directly? Or is it that he's thinking "Why," as the article suggests, "waste the time commenting when he can comment when we meet for dinner?" Is he not commenting because he's sending a subtle message that I am not as important anymore?  Is he flirting with someone else and therefore can't fawn all over my profile picture change or make a witty comment on the link I post? 

Crazy I know. It used to be that you just had to snub someone in the school corridor or not call them for a date to blow them off. Now it is more complicated. There are more signals to look for and to miss.

And I may be especially paranoid about this because of Scott.

Late in the game I discovered something. He had stopped going on Facebook at all in the wake of our little SNAFU with the The Refrigerator Perry's twin sister, the Drill Team floozy and the UPS bimbo.  He told me he had no interest in it. He'd found what he wanted on Facebook when he'd found me. No other connections were important. He did not want to be found by anyone else either. He kept the account to keep an eye on the social media lives of his teenaged daughters.

But that wasn't exactly a good thing.

People who were my FB friends could see that I had tagged him in all manner of situations. Graduation, wave running, happy houring, brunching on the water, buying fudge on the Boardwalk.

But if you were his friend and not mine, his absence from Facebook meant something else. It meant that I was absent.

I was absent from his life on Facebook.