Crowd around, everyone - over here by the bar. Someone tell Evan to stop playing pool and come over. Yes. Stand behind the railing there. Link arms, guys in the back. Let me dim that pendant light so the flash doesn't wash everything out. We're going to go ahead and completely make up this memory so that everyone can look back at it and remember how forced and orchestrated it is. Put your drinks down and out of the frame.
Stand according to height and smile outward. Act like you're laughing at a joke told by an imaginary person that we all love. Make sure you are touching the person next to you in some way so we can document the transparent sense of comradery that was awkwardly arranged against your will at the expense of actual, naturally-occurring fun. This is going to be great.
This will definitely be something for the old scrapbook. Especially if it is a scrapbook filled with empty, strained smiles and contorted, bemused expressions. If you are into reminiscing over laboriously captured, illegitimate memories that trigger no real fondness and represent a moment that should not have existed in the world, then this is going to be perfect. It will be available on Shutterfly tomorrow morning.
Where are Stacy and Tim? Still lingering in the lounge? Well, we will have to disrupt the true connection that they have discovered in order to complete this worthless non-event. When we idly glance at this photo later, we want to make sure Stacy and Tim are properly wedged into the wholly manufactured memory that is happening right now. Someone go get them and make them stand on either side of the stairwell.
When we're done with this we need to create some completely unrepresentative, instantly forgettable moments. I'll take a picture of your back when you're at the bar so it looks like you're talking to the strange man at the stool. I will cluster people who have never talked and make them stand silently while I wait for my inexplicably non-digital camera to load. I'll instruct you to touch each other's backs lightly, in an utterly false image of friendship, and be sure to catch your grimaces as they wane into passable half-smiles. This will make for a really perverse reflection of reality that we can all set as our screensavers!
