Monday, March 3, 2008

Where Relationships Go to Die

Technology can make break-ups a real bitch. Is there anything that burns more than the day your Facebook newsfeed informs you that your ex switched their relationship status to single? Why don't they just add a "heyyyyyyyyyyyy" application that means they are ready to troll someone in your social network. Then there are the daily reminders, knowing when they add new movies to their favorites....Who did he see Michael Clayton with anyway? And the dreaded day you find out they are are "now friends" with their significant other from college.

All of these touch points can make it hard to let go. Enter Dating Obituaries -- a site that I learned about from the thrillist -- where people can post relationship obituaries after break-ups. The girl who started the site was inspired after she broke up with her boyfriend and shortly thereafter had to return to her hometown for her father's funeral. Writing her father's obituary gave her a sense of closure that inspired her to draft a relationship obituary for her recent break-up and eventually create a site for others to contribute theirs. Most of the posts are straightforward, personifying the relationship complete with a cause of death such as "jealousy," "drugs" or "arrogance" while some are more poetic, capturing their romance in odd dada-like haiku. My favorite titled "Adolf and Josef" likens the couples' break-up to Hitler's invasion of Poland, "Adolf got greedy and invaded my half of the bed." Interestingly, the majority of the post-mortums seem to end in a burying of the hatchet, giving the author/victim an opportunity to RIP, at last.

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