Back when I was young, we graduated from high school and went off to college, and gradually lost touch with most everyone we had known and gone to school with our entire lives. (Keep in mind I grew up in a small town where everyone knew everyone. And everyone's parents, and grandparents, and cousins....)
It wasn't intentional or willful, or even desirable, necessarily. There was no easy way to contact them and remain in conversation with them - phone calls were long distance and expensive, and letters took too long - and it just sort of happened.
Even remaining in the same small town didn't guarantee maintaining those old friendships, because other people moved away, and, well, life evolves. You would occasionally hear about people from your parents, of course, or have the happy moment of running into them when one or both of you were home visiting, and you could catch up briefly, and it was really fun.
But gradually, in the normal course of living your life, you would lose touch with most people until you realized, one day, that you no longer thought of this or that person as a "friend," in the current sense of the word. Instead, they were now someone you knew "when I was in high school." You remembered them fondly, but it would have been awkward to just write a letter or call them out of the blue, and that was another mild regret to add to the ever lengthening list.
That was something that went along with growing up, and living your adult life. I barely see my neighbor and close friend who lives across the street, much less someone living hundreds of miles away. For most of my life, it was just the way things were, and there wasn't much you could do about it.
My son and I had a conversation on that very topic awhile ago that has now come back to haunt me, but in a good way. As a member of the Millennial generation, he has never known a time when there weren't computers and e-mail. Cell phones were not science fiction, a la Maxwell Smart or James Bond or Batman, but an everyday reality for most of his life. He was an early user of Facebook, back in the day when it was limited to college students only, and it's main intent was to help kids connect with other kids who were attending their same institution of higher learning.
He is not suspicious, like I am, of every new technological advancement. He takes advantage of anything that makes his day easier or which he perceives to enhance the quality of his life, and he embraces technology with enthusiasm for all the benefits it brings to his life. He immediately understood the advantages of a Facebook world, and as I said, he was one of the first people to sign on, before he even arrived on his college campus.
Anyway, on this particular day that I mentioned, we were discussing "real friends" versus "Facebook friends," a term which has instant meaning for anyone who has been on Facebook for any length of time at all. I will explain [as briefly as is possible for me] for those who haven't heard the term, and don't understand what it means.
Most people have friends they know well, whom they see regularly, or at least with whom they remain in regular contact, just as people have done since time began.
They also have acquaintances that are encountered in church, at school, at work, or wherever people congregate. You don't really know them well, you wouldn't call them to go to a movie or meet for a cup of coffee, but you know enough about them to at least say hello and have a conversation with them when you see them out and about.
Now, in this computer age, there is another set of people with whom friendship is primarily found in cyberspace, and it's a weird sort of relationship, indeed. You may know more about them than you do about your next door neighbor, because Facebook keeps you up to date on everything they are doing (to say nothing about Twitter, but let's not even go there.) Every time they post a picture or update their profile or simply have a thought, you are notified by the server on the mothership in the cyberspace universe, but you may not recognize them if you run into them on the street or in a store.
While you are generally connected to your real friends on Facebook, you can now add everyone that knows everyone you've ever known, and the people who know them, as well. Friends of friends will suddenly friend you, and before you know it, you have over a thousand Facebook friends (my socially adept daughter, for example,) made up mostly of people you've never met.
[On the one hand, it's sort of creepy to know that your best friend's cousin's girlfriend's brother is on an extended visit to Peru. But it's also sort of hard to resist looking at the pictures that he posts from his cell phone each evening, too.]
It seems kind of weird to me, this accumulation of names and people that have no genuine connection with you, other than as a number in your list of competitive friending. It was that phenomenon which got the conversation with my son going, but we quickly expanded beyond that to discuss how he has kept in touch with high school classmates and never really lost those relationships, although they have, as expected, evolved.
His most persuasive argument for this type of social networking was simple and compelling; why lose touch with people when you don't have to? And what is the harm in remaining friends, he pointed out, even if only Facebook friends, with someone whom you haven't seen in a long time, and with whom you may not have a lot in common now, but who had shared the experience of growing up with you? Since I didn't really have a counterpoint to that very logical and reasonable position, the conversation ended with my feeling slightly dissatisfied about having been on the wrong side of an argument that should have been obvious, since I have lost far more friends than he has over the years!
This conversation has come back to haunt me in the last few days, as I said before, in the best possible way. I have suddenly reconnected, all in the last week, and thanks to the internet and Facebook, with several people with whom I shared my growing up years, and it has been the most fun I have had in a long time. To catch up and talk with people whom I knew, and who knew me, when we were five or ten or 15 is even more fun that I would have imagined. Not surprisingly, it turns out we are avidly interested in what each other's lives look like now, and very happy to suddenly have a way to find out again.
I have never attended a class reunion, I never understood the desire before, but suddenly, I am having the class reunion anyway, without ever leaving my sofa. I am annoyed to find out that my mother was right again; it is a lot of fun to catch up and see, not only how all those people turned out, but how varied and interesting they all are. All those sullen and hormonal teenagers, (myself more than anyone, I'm sure!) suddenly revere their parents, have serious careers, have gotten married or divorced (or both,) have difficulties with their children, and actually make plans with the siblings they couldn't stand when we were young. Who knew?!
One of the reconnections for me came through a roundabout path. A woman, Patrea (isn't that a lovely and unique name?!) that went to elementary school with me, and who attended my church until her family moved when we were about ten, was traveling through my hometown, and actually remembered me from way back when. [Trust me, I am far more shocked than anyone at that.]
She asked someone at my little country church to pass her e-mail along to me. It traveled from there to my mom, who then passed it along to me, and eventually, when I found a few free minutes, I sent off the first attempt to reconnect.
I was nervous, sort of like a first date with someone you have heard about, but don't really know. I didn't know what to say about myself, or my life, because I didn't know if she would be interested or not, so it was an awkward attempt, to say the least.
A few days later, I received a wonderful and enthusiastic reply, with the tale of her life in brief, and the wish that we would now stay in touch. I replied with a longer and more forthcoming story of my life, and am now awaiting her reply with happy anticipation. Without e-mail, this would never have happened, and we would have missed out on something that has brought me, at least, pleasure I didn't even know I would feel.
I have a cousin, Mary, who is very socially engaging. Her laugh is irresistible, and she is a warm and caring person. So it's pretty obvious why everyone wants to be her friend!
Hearing from Pat made me start to wonder about other people I had been friends with growing up, and naturally, I turned to Mary's Facebook page. [Yes, that's correct, I continue to be the little cousin dogging everyone's heels!] As it turns out, she is, not surprisingly, ridiculously talented at locating people online, and I raided her friend list to find a few for myself. Mary has obviously been very busy rounding people up, because she has pretty much everyone I've ever known in her list of friends, and I have been slowly but surely adding them myself.
It turns out her younger brother, my cousin Tom, was on Facebook, so I was able to wish him a happy birthday, something I haven't done in years, despite always thinking of him on that day, because all it required of me was a simple click. From there, someone else found me and friended me, and we have now had a fun and interesting conversation.
I found another girl I knew my entire life, and whom I have missed over the years, but never thought to contact, because it was just too complicated. Suddenly, we are writing back and forth, comparing notes on life, and divorce, and our kids, and it is not only fun, but rewarding to find that no matter how far we have come, those people you cared about so much growing up, and who cared about you, still do. It is like discovering your long lost relatives, in a way, and it is very gratifying.
I am, as most people who know me well will attest, a pretty confirmed introvert. As anyone who reads this blog regularly knows, I am cynical and jaded by a life that has had more bumps and scrapes and bruises than it should have, mostly self-inflicted, and I find it difficult to trust and make friends with people.
So for me, this is a different kind of experience. Not only do I not need to explain where I come from, or who I really am, they already know the most important things about me, because they were all there while they were happening. That small town farm girl still lives in me, and that is someone they already know.
While there are certainly some dangers involved in the internet, including identity theft, online stalking, and that whole creepy Googling-pictures-of-my-house-where-you-can-see-my-furniture-on-my-deck thing, the benefits have always outweighed the risks for me. I understand the attitude of the young, who regret the parental intrusions into their formerly out-of-reach online world. But now that even my 82 year old mother has a facebook page, it is evident that Facebook is here to stay, and it is a good thing.
[Brief update: My lovely mother decided it was just too complicated, and had me delete her page!]
If you haven't gotten yourself a Facebook page, I encourage you to go online and get one. At best, you will find out who you didn't even know you were missing until you find them, or they find you. At the least, you will find yourself more in touch with the people who matter most to you. Evolution in the computer age simply means adding to your list of friends, and it's a lot of fun.
Happy hunting!
