A few days ago, I opened my Facebook to 47 notifications. Needless to say, I was thrilled people were finally recognizing the caliber of my Facebook profile, which includes biannual statuses about life-changing events and stunning tagged pictures of me at my best.
My high hopes and dreams were quickly shattered when I realized what reality entailed. Sumedha Deshmukh à la 2009 was back. My middle school posts had risen once again.
This would not be an issue if I truly were the dazzling example of social grace and beauty I thought myself to be at the time. But, no. Instead, I was awkward, angsty and did not know how desperately I needed to get my eyebrows done.
A few of my personal favorites can be found below.
1. “exhausteddd. best way to recoverrr ? partyy[:”
This, boys and girls, is the proper way to employ the super expressive bracket smiley, the gem of all smiley faces. I guess you could say I was kind of a hipster in middle school, because the regular smiley faces were just too mainstream. Additionally, I must say I’m blown away by the wisdom I displayed in this particular status. Best way to recover from exhaustion? Party? Of course! This especially makes sense because my middle school parties involved drama, babysitting rowdy children and old, drunk Indian people dancing around in circles.
2. “once again, indian guys prove themselves to be girls.”
Here, we have a stellar example of my early teenage angst. Need further explanation? Just check out the comments, where I responded to a poor Indian boy trying to defend his manhood: “ohmygod are you kidding me? you guys gossip more than us. you’re sooo catty.” Zinger! Good one, young me.
3. “hairrrcutttt[: might post pics laterrr”
A haircut with three Rs, four Ts and a bracket smiley? This must have been one special haircut. Spoiler alert: much to the disappointment of my groupies who patiently waited — okay, the six people who “liked” my status — pictures never materialized. My friend kindly pointed this out when bringing the post back to the newsfeed last week.
Unfortunately, the disappointment did not end there, as many people comment about their continued “interest” in this haircut. Things got real, though, when my aunt overlooked the date on the post and messaged me yesterday, informing me she was “still waiting for my haircut pix.” I am considering going bald purely so the status will live up to its hype.
What I did to deserve this kind of maltreatment remains a mystery — okay, I may have made a friend’s old tweet involving the word “trillest” resurface. But, despite the embarrassment, young Sumedha’s Facebook posts have taught me so many lessons, including:
1. Facebook’s timeline feature sucks and I should have been more diligent about deleting old posts.
2. If I ever need wonderful life advice, I should reference said old posts because they are full of golden nuggets of knowledge.
3. The bracket smiley is always relevant.
4. I definitely, without doubt, need new friends.
Sumedha’s column runs biweekly Tuesdays. She can be reached at s.deshmukh@cavalierdaily.com.
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