The Coming & Going Of Friends, In A Facebook World

It took me some time when I was younger, back in my college days, to realize that being friends with someone didn’t necessarily mean for life. Some friends were like chapters in a book; read and part of the whole book but not part of the following chapters in the book. Some friends were part of a continuing plot, always appearing over and over again.

As a kid, I had friends I thought I’d have forever. Childhood friends, best friends. Then we all moved into new schools, from elementary to junior high and high school. Plus, some of us moved away. Over those years, over those changes, the friendships also changed.

There’s no one from my elementary school and junior high school days that I still keep in touch with. I have a very few high school friends that I occasionally hear from now and then. It seems like those friendships I made in my college years crowded out the other ones. Or perhaps there are only so many friendships we can maintain?

Even from college, most of those friendships got replaced with those from work, especially my newspaper days and later, my friends I’ve known through search.

Going back to college, I remember being sad about some of the friends I’d lost touch with. Perhaps this was when I was first really aware of how much friendship can change over time. I started appreciating that some people I would be friends with for a short period then probably never see again.

In particular, I had one friend who worked with me on my campus newspaper. We shared an English class together, sitting in the back, sometimes mocking the professor, sometimes catching each other up if we’d missed a lecture. For some reason, I was hyperaware that we’d probably never be friends like that again. Not that we were super close friends to begin with, but we did enjoy that class, that collision of the moment. And I was content knowing that the moment would move on, followed by other, new ones.

I have some friends that I might not see or contact for literally years. But when I see them, it is as if nothing has changed. We pick up right where we left off, and I’ve realized that this is OK, too. That being friends doesn’t necessarily mean a constant contact; while also that some friends may be momentary while no less lasting in other ways.

Interestingly, Facebook has become a great disruptor to the calmness I’ve acquired about friendships. Suddenly people I haven’t talked to for years, people I figured I’d never see again, are popping up. How technology has changed us. Certainly old friends would reunite in the past. But so many and so easily? How do we cope, how do we react, when we’ve moved ahead in our lives, with these renewed contacts.

I’ve been to one high school reunion, my 20th, back a few years ago. It was interesting. I did see many people who I’d thought, where are they now? What are they up to? But one thing I remember most about was how none of us really swapped phone number or addresses.

It could be that we all assumed we’d be able to find ourselves through the reunion directory or something. But I think really it was that that reunion was enough for most of us. High school was long over; that bond and those times were things we’d progressed from. The friendships were real, but they didn’t translate into continuing ones.

There were some people I’d really wanted to see who didn’t show up. I remember being disappointed they weren’t there and yet to this date, I still haven’t looked them up. Perhaps I will, and perhaps I’ll add to the unsettled nature of someone else’s calmness in friendships come-and-gone.