Who’s your best friend? It’s a question I expect a primary schooler to ask. But low and behold, there is a day for this.

Most of us have great friends throughout life. Perhaps at any given time, you can even identify who is your “best” friend at the given moment. But “best” and “friend” are not two words that easily relate. A lot of my friends annoy me greatly, on a regular basis. Why? Because they are unique – they are not me. We are not clones. We have similarities, but also many dissimilarities. And that’s often why I click with them!

Example, one of my best friends right now is a conservative Christian. This is absolutely anathema to my position and perspective on life, the world, and the pursuit of happiness. Hell, I joke with my mom that I was saved when I gave up on the Christian faith she indoctrinated me with. (Though, she’s ditched it too now, so the joke gets a laugh.)

But he’s a good, kind person. It’s not his fault that the media and personal experiences of his life have turned him into what he is. And I don’t base friendships on political perspectives or thoughts on the afterlife; I base my friendships on emotional and mental reciprocity. (I should note that my friend and I both avoid discussing anything political or religious. I have those meaningful exchanges with my other friends; typically, my European ones.)

On any given day after work, this friend is my best friend. We loan one another power tools and cheer on one another’s daughters at the local softball games. During work, on the other hand, I have several other close friends that take the mantel of best friend. It’s shifting. I love all my friends. But they can’t all be “best” all the time, right?

Heck, throughout life, there are people I’ve hung out with, met, built strong relationships with, and lost touch with, that are still considered some of my bestest friends. They literally shaped my worldview and perspective on things based on their behaviors, quips, and empathy. And those worldviews are difficult to shake. They stuck to me like superglue.

Sadly, many of those people from the past are now dead. (The bane of being 50, I guess.) I miss them. I miss knowing that they are still somewhere out there fighting the good fight. That there is someone out there that may still smile, smirk, and roll their eyes at one of my slightly inappropriate, off-putting jokes – aside from my family members, that is.

Losing best friends really, really hurts. But it happens. In fact, if you live long enough, you’ll lose all of them. (That is the bane of hitting 100 years old, I’ve been told. Not by a friend, but by several 100 year-olds, nonetheless.) I remind my kids of this fact all the time. You’re going to lose friends. Friends die. Friends disappear. Some aren’t even on social media. It sucks. So let them know you appreciate them while they are around.

So today is the day I’m going to take a moment to let some of my friends, indeed not all, but I probably don’t have too many beyond this honestly, know that I appreciate them. Quite a few, as mentioned, are no longer with us. But I figure that if the universe really is just a quantum dataset, perhaps by including them in this digital map they will still somehow get the message. Even if they don’t, it makes me feel better recognizing them.

It’s a real map. A sincere map. And also intentionally vague, because if there is one thing I know, it’s that friends – particularly some of my European friends who naively still believe they have a smidgen of privacy from US big tech and Chinese spyware – don’t like to be doxxed.

I know I forgot people. Some were intentionally left off so as to not piss off other friends that may be jealous of certain friends… my goodness, friendship is fun, isn’t it?! But the point is: I am who I am because of these people (and many others not included), and this is my way of recognizing some of you and saying thank you. You’ve been mapped. If friends were colonial possessions, I could now say that you exist and you are mine – because I mapped you. But you’re not a possession. I don’t take you for granted. You’re just a friend on a map.

View Map Here

Prompt to Map My Friends

I would like you to create a very simple, minimalist interactive web map (HTML, CSS, JS, data file) of the attached CSV spreadsheet.

The spreadsheet has a list of my best friends, including place names for where I met them, where we last met, the year of our first meeting, the year of our last meeting, and each friend’s current place on the planet. As well as whether or not the friend is deceased.

I would like to make a simple and vulnerable map of my best friends in life.

Please map the world as an equal area projection using generalized country boundaries. The country outlines should be soft gray. The countries themselves white. The map background should be white. Geography doesn’t matter so much. It’s merely there for global reference.

For the title: “Not all my friends are dead…”
Subtitle: “In recognition of non-blood relative friendships I’ve most cherished throughout my life.”

I would like each person to be represented by a simple, two-dimensional, flat smiley face symbol. The original, simple yellow smiley face, please. 14-20px. Yellow background with simple single line black smile and two black dots for eyes.

When the map loads start showing the symbols one by one based on where we met, in chronological order. Show all of them within 15 seconds.

Then fade in a control panel in the upper right. It should be set to “Where we met…”
When clicked, a dropdown menus should show two more options:
– “Where we last met…”
– “Where they are now…”

When the user clicks on “Where we lat met…” keep the same symbols but relocate them to the places we last met (using lat/lon of that value).

Finally, when the user clicks “Where are they now…” show where the friends are now. IMPORTANT: if the friend is deceased, change the symbol from a smiley face to a small dark gray tombstone icon. Keep the icon minimalist, simple, and respectable.

When the user clicks on any of the icons, please show the friend’s first name, information about where we met (place name, not lat/lon), where we last met (place name), and where they currently are.

No sources. No reliability scores. No credits. No source modal. Just a very straight-forward, poignant map. Stripped down, like the Beatles White Album.

Thank you!