"Death Likes This"

THIS ARTICLE attempts to answer the new valid question of our age:

What do you do when a Facebook friend who you vaguely know dies suddenly? What's the most sanity-inducing route of dealing with the fact that you have weird online links to their internet presence? A childhood friend passed away this week at the age of 32. It was a surprise. I had not talked to her in about five years.

As you surely remember, I was struck with surprise awhile back re: finding out a person I knew was not only dead, but had been dead for a while. I didn't find this out on Facebook, but it was online:

And it turns out not only is she dead, but she's been dead for 13 years. Died at the age of 24. After I met her, she only lived another six years. Mind-boggling. It's not even as if she's just died, and the scars are fresh; people close to her have had almost a decade and a half to move on. She's the ghost in the yearbook, a goddam black and white photo. Yellowed pages. But I can still see her in that blue/yellow Heidelberg High sweatshirt, getting on the elevator. Goddam. 1997. It's amazing what can take the wind out of your sails on any given night. 

Hmm. The second time someone from the 2006 Mrs. Xmastime list has been mentioned today. Hmm.