I have a tradition of personally responding to everyone who wishes me a happy birthday on Facebook. Nobody asked me to do this. There is no law requiring it, and Facebook has yet to threaten to suspend my account for failing to acknowledge someone I haven’t seen since 1983. Nevertheless, I have established this tradition, and now I feel obligated to maintain it. I’ve managed to turn people being nice to me into something I dread. That’s quite an accomplishment.

In the old days, I actually enjoyed it. I’d spend part of my birthday responding to everyone, clean up a few stragglers the following day, and move on with my life. It was a nice little celebration of my popularity, even if that popularity was largely manufactured by Facebook reminding people that I was still alive. I used to receive more than a hundred birthday wishes. That might sound impressive until you realize most of those people were simply clicking a button while waiting for their coffee to brew.

Over the years, my inner hermit has become considerably more assertive. I’ve also moved away from the area where many of these people live, and visits back are discouraged due to my participation in the witness protection program. Consequently, the birthday wishes have declined. You would think fewer wishes would make the process easier. Unfortunately, I’ve compensated for the reduced volume by increasing the amount of work I put into each response. Leave it to me to find a way to make less work more exhausting.

This year, the notifications started arriving Thursday morning. I ignored them until evening, when I began sorting through the various categories of people who had acknowledged my continued existence. Text messages and Messenger notes from family and former exchange students received immediate attention. Those are personal, and I enjoy hearing from them. The Facebook wishes were a different matter. They required an evaluation of how well I knew the person, when I last saw them, and whether I could come up with something more interesting than “Thank you. Hope you’re well.”

I have somehow created a classification system for birthday wishes. Close friends and relatives deserve a little extra effort. People I haven’t seen in twenty years require a different approach. And then there are the high school acquaintances whose names I recognize, but whose faces have undergone enough renovations that I wouldn’t recognize them at Walmart. For those people, I occasionally conduct a little research.

Yes, I look at their Facebook profiles. I’m trying to write a thank-you note, and I’ve turned it into a background investigation.

If I remember seeing something interesting about them recently, I’ll check their profile and attempt to work it into my response. Sometimes this produces something reasonably clever. Other times, I stare at their vacation pictures, grandchildren, and recent meals, hoping inspiration will strike before I lose the will to continue.

One cousin I haven’t seen in a couple of decades takes occasional driving trips. I responded, “Thanks! Let us know if you swing thru OKC.” Not exactly award-winning material, but it demonstrated that I knew something about her life and hadn’t simply copied and pasted my response. Of course, if she actually takes me up on the invitation, I may have created an entirely new obligation.

For someone I haven’t seen since high school, I managed, “Thank you. I bet your grill missed you.” There was something on his profile that made this relevant. At least I hope there was. Otherwise, I’ve just sent a former classmate a very strange message about his barbecue equipment.

The problem is that I don’t want to sound boring. Someone has taken the time to click a Facebook-generated birthday greeting, and I feel compelled to reward that effort with an original composition. They may have spent three seconds wishing me a happy birthday, while I spend five minutes trying to demonstrate that I’m still an interesting person. I’m beginning to suspect I’m getting the short end of this transaction.

By Friday, I was only about halfway through the responses. This was no longer a birthday celebration. It was an administrative backlog. I had other things I wanted to do, including writing something that didn’t begin with “Thank you.” Yet there I was, reviewing profiles and composing personalized acknowledgments for people who probably wouldn’t notice if I responded with a thumbs-up and a picture of a potato.

I’ve noticed that some people simply post one big thank-you to everyone who wished them a happy birthday. Some even manage to tag everyone involved. I briefly investigated how to accomplish this, but the answer wasn’t immediately obvious. Besides, that felt like cheating. I’ve spent years establishing an unnecessarily high standard for myself. Abandoning it now would mean admitting that all those previous hours could have been spent doing something more productive. I don’t need that kind of revelation at my age.

The ridiculous part is that I do the same thing to other people. Facebook tells me it’s someone’s birthday, I remember something about them, and I send a greeting. Sometimes it’s someone I haven’t seen in decades. I like to think my message is a thoughtful little reminder that I remember them. For all I know, they’re sitting at home wondering why I’ve just added another item to their birthday thank-you list. I may be contributing to a nationwide network of people exchanging obligations that nobody particularly wants to fulfill.

Still, I can’t dismiss the whole thing. Every once in a while, a birthday greeting leads to an actual conversation. I’ll remember something they posted a few months ago, ask about it, and we reconnect for a few minutes. Sometimes it’s nice to know that someone from another chapter of my life is still out there, even if neither of us has made much effort to stay in touch. Those occasional connections are probably why I keep doing this.

And I do appreciate the birthday wishes. I really do. I just wish I could appreciate them without feeling compelled to prove it individually, creatively, and within a reasonable response time.

I’ll finish responding to everyone eventually. Some will get a personalized message, others will get the reliable “Thank you. Hope you’re well,” and a few may receive something that makes them wonder whether I’ve suffered a minor head injury.

Then I’ll be done for another year. Unless, of course, someone responds to my response. I’m not sure what the protocol is for that, and I refuse to establish another tradition.