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When Mark Zuckerberg and his pals at Harvard sat around in their dorm rooms and envisioned the future, you can bet this did not happen: "Someday, people in their 60s, anxious to cling to a time when their knees didn't ache and they could read menus without glasses, will turn to our invention and see what's become of all their high school friends. It'll be fabulous."

Yet, that's pretty much what's happened. I've learned everything I know about the Class of '68 from Facebook. The biggest revelation? No other generation has been able to conclude, the way we have, that the cool kids got much less cool as time went by. Past generations have had to live long enough to get to that 50^th high school reunion to get the final word. Not us. We've got newsfeeds.

And conversely, something wonderful has happened to the glasses-wearing, science-loving geeky kids, who were always in the background. I know because I'm friended to two of them - lifelong friends of each other - who were so sweet, smart and dorky you almost had to look away. If they were boys who got their lunch money stolen or got stuffed in someone's locker between classes, Facebook tells me this is no longer true. They've had lucrative careers and long, happy marriages. These days, they upload glorious photos of the two of them hiking mountain ranges together. I don't know how this happened, but they're almost athletic.

The football team, many of whom ended up with bad backs and regrets about two-a-day practices - sure didn't see this coming when they tossed around these guys on the bus. And as for the surfers whom I worshipped from afar, like the rest of us, sun damage hasn't done their faces any favors. But the science nerdy boys, who tried to stay under the radar of the locker room crowd and have been wearing sun-proof gear for decades, look remarkable. Even when they smile they don't look weathered, the way - ahem - some people who peaked early and went around saying "Kowabunga" all through high school do now.

In the garden of the late bloomers, the kids who were in the background have blossomed. Facebook tells me so. And it's the news I've been waiting to read. So thanks, Facebook.

- Linda DeMers Hummel

Linda DeMers Hummel is a Baltimore-based freelancer. She recently completed a memoir, I Haven't Got All Day, and blogs at www.lindadhummel.com.