It’s one of those Facebook things—asking ten people to post ten photos with the hashtag #MyLifeIsGood. No need to explain who’s in the photos, says the meme, but one assumes the pictures will be of family, friends, beautiful vacation spots and how one spends their me time.

If you run the exponential mathematics on that, assuming you have ten cooperative friends—and those friends likewise have ten cooperative–obedient? –friends, and everybody posts ten photos, there will, quickly, be tens of thousands of harvestable images on Facebook, all neatly tagged #MyLifeIsGood.

Now—this isn’t a scold-y post about all the innocent, family-oriented, grateful folks inviting us into their (good) lives: meeting the grandkids, marveling at a Lake Michigan sunset, riding their bikes—and being scammed by Mark Zuckerberg into telling Facebook’s algorithms which ads and promoted articles to send them.

Expensive Swedish pajamas for those darling children, perhaps. A new boat, maybe—or thick flannel sheets. Or perhaps something much darker, with the collected data about what someone considers a #GoodLife going God knows where.

Speaking as a person who once (perhaps naively) called Facebook and other social media sites “our new town square,” I post personal information, as well as shared articles, snarky cartoons and my own blog on Facebook, Twitter and (now) Post.

I ran a political campaign on a Facebook page (now taken down). I have also experienced obvious bots –why do people think older women want a retired Marine General in their life?–and eerily specific products that I swear I just thought about, but never looked for online.

The thing about #MyLifeIsGood, though, is that it feels weird, somehow, to craft a colorful little photo collage about what matters most to you. My own life, frankly, is great right now in a dozen different ways—but searching through my hundreds of photos to display how lucky I am is unsettling somehow. Maybe my life won’t be so great in 2023—who knows? Or maybe there are tender or tragic factors that #GoodLife participants feel they must hide, putting up a false front. None of that is healthy.

The first thing I thought of, getting tagged to take part in the #MyLifeIsGood juggernaut was Randy Newman’s song My Life is Good. Newman’s lyrics are biting—with the chorus, ‘MY Life is Good,’ being the worst sort of heedless braggadocio: Don’t get in my way, lesser personage. Because MY life—is good. Too bad about yours.

There’s a verse about teachers:

The other afternoon my wife and I took a little ride into Beverly Hills.
Went to the private school our oldest child attends.

Many famous people send their children there.

His teacher says to us:
“We have a problem here–this child just will not do a thing I tell him to.
He’s such a big old thing. He hurts the other children.
All the games they play, he plays so rough.”

Hold it teacher. Wait a minute.

Maybe I’m not understanding the English language.
You don’t seem to realize—

MY Life Is Good. My life is good, you old bat.

Unfortunately, veteran teachers recognize this dude (and his wife)—and their entitled child.  There’s something distasteful about the idea of simple gratitude for what one has, and pride over what one’s accomplished, morphing into boasts or competition, the antithesis of building genuine community in a classroom.

Or maybe I am way overthinking this.

I am going to post one photo. It’s a photo of my dog, Atticus, who is aging, in his first (and last) Christmas sweater. He is one of the reasons my life is deeply satisfying—and good.