The Skull Beneath the Facebook

 I'm clearly getting on. My Facebook page is filled day after day with people whom I have never heard of dying. Its all that happens. It used to be pictures of people's dinners or sweeping panoramic views with the tag-line: "The office today." All those fucking Wordles. 

Now it's just death. Some bloke with a beard who was good at juggling. A smiley faced poet with purple hair. An inspirational teacher from the potteries. A local legend from a place I've never been to. 

I feel like I've hopscotched into a new demographic group, one that's full of black-ice, kinky spines and straitened circumstances. One which ends with a youthful doctor putting on a brave face as she waves a shadowy X-Ray. If they still have doctors by the time I get round to it...

You have to feel for them. I'd be terrible at delivering the bad news.

 "It's not great news..."

 "Am I going to die, doc? I'm ready."

 "Oh, God no. No. Of course not..." 

"Thank God, Oh thank you, doctor. Thank God."

 "Great. Yes. Good...no, it's actually bad news." 

"What is it?"

 "It's just...you are actually going to die. Sorry. I'm not good at giving bad news. I thought there'd be more training."

 "I'm going to die?"

 "'Fraid so. No one's more sorry than me." 

"I think I might be."

 "With respect, I knew before you did, and I'll remember long after you're dead - sorry, passed - so I think it's worse for me. And I had to tell you - so that's a burden. And seriously, I was expecting some  proper training. They just shove you in a room with some dying guy and tell you to get on with it."

 "Sorry, Doc."

 "Oh, I'm not a doctor..."