Facebook can present a somewhat one-dimensional picture of its habitues.

Take me, for example. Anyone who knows me three-dimensionally will tell you I’m kind, sweet, trusty, diligent, generous, capable, discerning, vivacious, saintly and modest. Sadly, folks who know me only through my occasional Facebook contributions might do me the unwitting injustice of believing me merely heroic. The fact that I don’t take it personally attests to another of my rare qualities, that of clemency.

Did I not mention I’m clement?

Oh, I’m totally clement.

I’m clement because I discern that the reason such a criminally narrow portrait of all that is I could emerge in the first place lies in Human Nature.  I have observed that, over time, most regular posters tend to slide into comfortable themes. Because I have lots of pictures of myself behaving heroically, that’s what I post. Because my frequent acts of saintliness don’t really photograph well, that aspect of my character tends to go unremarked. It’s the same with my Facebook friends.

Often it’s simply an interest – more than one person on my roll appears to spend the bulk of their time online sending me links to bands I’ve never heard of singing songs I don’t like in videos that give me a nervous bowel. Sometimes it’s a hobby, such as Astrology, by which art one regular friend recently divined that I can expect news, that topaz will help me control my lust, and that I should try to be more open to copper.

Yes, the metal.

Then there are those unimaginative sorts whose principle Facebook involvement is robotically passing along every witty remark, lurid brief, colorful picture and inspirational platitude that pops up on their wall. Not that I’m complaining, necessarily. Sometimes those trite posts really are funny, or fascinating, or pretty, or even encouraging. But distributing somebody else’s day-old tapioca is hardly revealing of oneself, and knowing that a person enjoys cartoons of animals doing people-things tells me nothing about their willingness to float me a Grover Cleveland on a handshake.

If the term “friend” was to have any meaning at all, I knew I must tear down the wall and meet the people behind the pap. I accomplished this easily (see “capable” above) by visiting the personal pages of those whose posts I admire – a privilege routinely granted between Facebook friends – and snooping around until my curiosity was satisfied.

In the name of research.

Linda Kirkpatrick publishes the online Evergreen news organ “Just Around Here”, and has been known to post links, tips and tidbits of interest or utility to the scribbling classes. One less diligent than myself might interpret Linda’s fixation on the written word as symptomatic of a bookish and retiring disposition. I am happy to report that such is not the case. There, on her home page, is the glowing blue assurance that she earned her sheepskin at Katharine Gibbs College in Boston, Mass. Now, I don’t know Katharine Gibbs from Andy Gibb, but I do know that Beantown is lousy with persons of Irish extraction, and the wise will appreciate that four years in that peaty melting pot must necessarily have rendered Kirkpatrick drunken, maudlin, truculent, bone-idle, sporatically violent, and prone to spontaneous jigging whenever the English pound dips against the “nicker.”

See? She’s more fun already.

Joe Watt doesn’t post often, but when he does it’s usually a picture of Joe Watt. The uncritical friend might suspect that Joe Watt is either building a modeling portfolio or simply entertains a healthy regard for Joe Watt. Both may be true, but that’s only part of the picture. Truth is, Joe Watt’s page is full of things Joe Watt likes that aren’t Joe Watt. He likes the Beatles, whose music is pleasing to Joe Watt. He likes Yarn West, a business owned by Joe Watt’s wife, Laura, and producing monies that can be spent on Joe Watt. And Joe Watt likes the Alliance for Kids, possibly because the Alliance Against Kids registration line kept Joe Watt on hold for nearly a minute, and Joe Watt doesn’t stand in line for anybody.

Even Joe Watt.

Thus we see that drawing conclusions based solely on the content of a person’s Facebook posts does a disservice to both poster and postee. The lazy surfer might dismiss Kirkpatrick as a bespectacled tome-totaler, but that would be to ignore her dangerous Gaelic idiosyncrasies. And only the indifferent friend would peg Joe Watt as nothing more than a shameless camera hound without taking a moment to explore his many outside (if tangentially related) interests.

So take a moment. Dig a little deeper. You may find that the person you’ve written off as a shallow Johnny One-Note is really a rich symphony of layers, textures and disturbing eccentricities. And the heroic cyber-chum you’ve been marveling over these many months may embody sublime virtues not evident at in their posts.

Modesty prevents me.

Royalty.

Yours truly.

No, seriously.

And I don’t mean royalty like that Johnny-come-lately Windsor crew. I’m talking about a divine right stretching back to the dim and darkly days when the dapper Duke of Cambridge’s clan wore mostly dirt and ate boiled peat for breakfast, lunch and tiffin. But hey, I’m not here to run down my noble cousins.

That would be common.

I’m here to talk about the social media’s awesome ability to socially elevate. Sure, I’m an extreme case, but several other examples pompously strode across my Facebook wall this month, each instructive of how reg’lar folk can exploit the reality-altering power of the Internet to raise themselves above the common swamp and achieve a mossy perch of marginal respectability.

Case in point:

A few weeks ago, Linda Morris posted a photograph of, and link to, a fancy-pants “tea sandwich” recipe. They’re dainty little morsels, full of hifalutin ingredients like Persian cucumbers, chopped scallions, and a cheese that has, if I understand correctly, been “creamed” in some way. Thing is, I’ve learned through semi-reliable channels that Linda subsists almost exclusively on a diet of Slim Jims, Pringles and Mountain Dew. And yet, in a stroke, she’s now perceived in more credulous circles as a woman of taste and refinement. I downloaded the recipe because it looks like the sort of thing that hereditary kings probably eat a lot of.

Without the crusts.

Tom Carby raised his public stock by sweatier means, posting this self-congratulatory notice on Apr. 10: “This is the 100^th day of 2012. I completed my 10,000^th pushup today. 100 pushups a day for 100 days. What’s next?”

Surgery would be my guess, but you can see how Tom, who once refused to get up off his La-Z-Boy and open the door for the Publishers Clearing House Prize Patrol because “I just got comfortable”, has, with a few keystrokes, turned a dreary exercise regimen into a solid cyber-reputation for physical prowess. Of course, once I assume my rightful place atop society’s Olympus, I’ll doubtless have people to do my pushups for me.

You know – little people.

On the other hand, while a fitness cred might evoke a certain grudging deference from Buchanan’s stationary-bike crowd, it won’t cut much ice with the pomegranite-martini-and-brie-brouchee brigade down Gotham-way. That’s probably why John Steinle shunned gym shorts in favor of a smart blue double-breasted with gold piping and two shiny rows of brass. No, he didn’t dress up as Cap’n Crunch, but that was a good guess. He was impersonating Capt. Edward Smith, by which artifice he secured a berth at the Molly Brown House Titanic Dinner and Gala at the Oxford Hotel.

Implausible? Not at all. Consider – Capt. Smith had a beard and mustache; John has a beard and mustache. Smith was born in on Jan. 27, 1850, in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, England; John was also born. Capt. Smith’s last words are purportly “Be British”; The last words John said to me were “be quiet.” A masterful illusion, and by posting a photograph of himself in the guise of the unfortunate ship’s unfortunate skipper, John has achieved a new and superior social status by virtue of contrived association. Good show! But you may be wondering what all that has to do with my own claim to majesty.

Not as much as you’d think.

Late last month, Kayte Christopher-Walker posted a simple diagram professing to describe the three most common types of human toe arrangement – Greek, Roman and Egyptian. It came as quite a revelation, as I had not previously imagined that somebody might take the time and effort to codify such information.

“Did I really just pull my sock off to find out which way my toes are aligned?” Kayte wrote. Of course she did, and I did too. When Socrates said “know thyself,” he appended no exemption of the pedal extremities. Meticulous examination reveal my toes to be an artistic blending of the blunt Roman and tapering Egyptian styles. The conclusion is as obvious as it is inescapable – I am directly descended from a heretofore unidentified love-child of well-heeled Roman general Mark Antony and Cleopatra VII Philopater, the last of Egypt’s cash-flush Ptolemy line. I’ve checked my findings twice, on both feet, and there can be no mistake.

It’s science.

The way I’ve got it figured, I’m entitled to either a triumphal arch on the Piazza del Popolo and my own province (Calabria or better), or else clear title to Alexandria. Either way, as soon as I submit my evidence to the proper agencies, I don’t expect you’ll be detecting my haunting fragrance behind you at the supermarket checkout anymore because I’ll be reclining on a silk divan in my Mamluk palace nibbling crust-less tea sandwiches and seeing to it that my valet de chambre does at least 100 power-crunches a day.

For my fitness cred.