You know how when you feel you’re suddenly a grown up and you’re in complete control of your life? And you find yourself making grown-up decisions that affect not only yourself but other people too? And all of the baggage of your early life, including how you feel about yourself and how your friends and family perceive you is no longer the issue it once was? I thought I had that stuff under control, too, but every so often something comes along and pricks that bubble and you find yourself once again in a moment of deep introspection? OK, maybe it’s just me…

But anyway, there’s a fabulous little application on Facebook that allows you to vote on which friends you find more attractive, who you would rather snog, who you would rather be trapped on a desert island, and all that other kind of meaningless crap. Oddly enough, however, when you look at this at a deeper level, you start to see trends about how your friends perceive you to be. For example, amongst my friends, I’m the person 4 out of 5 would rather travel with. 3 out of 3 thought I was kinder. 3 out of 4 thought I would make a better father. The list goes on.

Mostly it seems my friends think I’m kind, gentle, trustworthy, and all of those good things. And I guess that’s why they’re my friends. And I’ll probably say the same about them. That said, quite a few of those friends on Facebook are colleagues who I hardly ever see outside work. And in my deeper moments, it makes me wonder if sometimes throughout life I’ve been too much of those things. Maybe I should have been tougher? Maybe I’m too nice sometimes?

“What’s sparked that outburst?”, I hear you ask. “One too many gin and tonics?”, I hear you wonder. Not sure, really, except I guess that even at 42, you never really stop wondering about how the world perceives you.

PS. This was a post for Graeme who says I never reveal enough of “the real me” on this blog.

PPS. Do you think my friends were being ironic when they thought I had a “better body”? :)