Have you ever heard the saying that “rumors run fast and the truth walks slow?”  I wonder if we should modify that little saying now that we have facebook to something like, “rumors fly at lightening speed ….”

I have Facebook notify me via text message whenever somebody tags my name on facebook.  So, at around 11 AM on Saturday while I was here at the funeral home doing some paper work, my phone started buzzing.  I looked at my phone and it displayed the text of a facebook message that stated something to the effect, “I’m sorry for your loss.”  Not realizing I had lost anything, I thought, “Well, I had better find out WHAT I lost.”  So I jumped online, did a little research and found a thread stating that apparently I had lost my Uncle Jim … that is, he had died (apparently the rumor started outside of facebook … although I’m still not 100% sure where it originated).

I work with my Uncle here at the funeral home.  In fact, I had seen him at the funeral home only a half hour before this all took place and was pretty sure he wasn’t dead.  So, I called around, got a hold of Uncle Jim’s son, who stated, “He’s not dead … I’m looking right at him.”

I quickly got back online, and triumphantly stated in the thread, “My Uncle’s still alive and well!”  Unfortuntely, by this time the rumor had spread all around town.

On Sunday, it went around the local churches’ prayer chain that “Jim Wilde had died.”  And since then all the good-hearted people of Parkesburg have been calling here at the funeral home to express their condolences.

In fact, from what I understand, my uncle walked into his own church and many in his own church were surprised to see him vertical.  After church, he went to a local restaurant and had people running up to him, exclaiming how happy they were to see him still in the land of the living.

He even got a free meal from the restaurant owner (who also thought he had died), which — according to my uncle — was enough to redeem the whole of the rumor.  Uncle Jim’s a good guy and none of us look forward to the day that he’s gone, and thankfully that day has yet to come.

Here are two morals to the story: Don’t believe everything you read on facebook.  And, if you ever see a man you thought was dead eating at your restaurant, offering him free food will make everything better!

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