Separate Paths
And so it all ends with the click of a mouse. I’ve unfriended people on Facebook many times in the past. It usually happens when some twit I’ve never met in the real world says something monumentally stupid or incredibly rude and I ask myself “why in the four-alarm freaking hell am I keeping this asshole in my life?” Then I press the button and make them disappear. It can be a very satisfying experience. There are few things more fruitless than a Facebook pissing contest and, having weathered more than a few of these online fiascos, I am looking to find better things to do with my time. But my most recent unfriending was quite different from the usual routine. And much more painful. This person was a former best friend of mine who cut himself out of my life for reasons I still haven’t quite figured out. We met about 20 years ago at a job in Manhattan and we just hit it off. My friend--I’ll call him Phil--was a great guy with a fabulous sense of humor. We started hanging ou...