Stumbling across a conversation with my mother on LinkedIn

I was cleaning out my messages --- mostly spam --- on LinkedIn. Open. Click. Delete. Are you sure? the automated message asks? Yes. OpenClickDeleteYesOpenClickDeleteYes.

At the bottom of the list was a three-message-long conversation between my mother and I.

Karen Fabian 11:16 AM

I was linked to you before. Not sure what happened.

Gabriella Cisneros 11:32 AM

this is a different account

you made a different account. try logging in with a different email

Karen Fabian 12:04 PM

I can't figure it out because all the LinkedIn e-mails come to my work e-mail. This other guy from here said he has the same issue. I guess when I have to look for a new job I'll delve into it.

The featureless grey silhouette of her un-personalized profile picture haunts me, as unrecognizable as her face was the last time I'd seen her. At her funeral.

I consider her untouched Facebook account, which she'd barely used anyway. She only reposted a link to impeach Trump and the rest was my cousin, her niece, posting "Happy Birthday" images for the past two years. My gut tells me to close her Facebook. She hated social media anyway. A small part of me --- the part that squeezes shut like a fist, the part that shrinks into a little girl --- tells me not to let her go. Not again.