Monday, January 09, 2006

Friendship

"Less than one percent of friends stay close after graduation... Challenge the statistic."
That's what the mural in our high school hallway said. We had lots of murals, they were done by the students and brightened up the drab institutional halls a lot. That one sticks in my mind though, because after two years I'm beginning to see the truth of it.

Allison, Madison, Laura, Casey, Nicole, Roxie, Devin, Kymrie, Rachel, Eric, Steve, Josh, and JP were the classmates I spent the most time with two years ago. Now I hang out with Al, and talk to Nicole, Steve and Josh online, and rarely. The others have seemingly disappeared - no phone calls, letters, emails, or greetings passed on by other friends. I'm not blaming them, though. I haven't exactly been showering my former friends with news and information. Most of them don't know my address at school or home (in today's world, who needs a mailing address to talk to a friend?), and I'm sure they're as busy as I am, which means nobody has (or makes) time to sit down and send off a quick email. I haven't even gotten a Christmas card from any of them. Oh well, eh? Times change, people change, life goes on. But I still miss them occasionally, and I still feel like I'm being left out of important happenings - like when I check Nicole's mySpace blog and it says "my bf". ...she has a boyfriend? It'd be nice if I knew who, and when, and what brought that on - she's heavily Christian and I seriously expected her to be single into her twenties when she decided to find the Perfect Man to marry. Not that I had anything against that decision but suddenly her having a boyfriend is... well, like Al having one. Coincidentally, she does too, now. But at least I got to hear about it when it happened.

I guess what I'm saying is that even though I'm not the best at staying in touch and letting people know what's going on in my life, I'd still like a chance to discuss these kinds of changes every once in a while - before too much happens and we just have to stand there grinning awkwardly next time we meet, because we don't know each other any more. All it takes is one email, or letter, or (even though I hate the phone) a call, because I want to talk and will find the time, but not if you don't want to; and the less I hear from you the less it seems you want to hear from me.
"Make new friends, but keep the old; One is silver and the other, gold." (Girl Scout Friendship Song)

3 comments:

  1. i've looked for you online but i don't see you much now. maybe i'm around at the wrong times, but eh. o.o

    anyway, you can still always try calling me.

    i'm with bronson a lot too, but if you want his cell number or anything, you can get me through that. just ask.

    i hate phones too or i'd call more.
    and i am not sure where i'm supposed to be writing letters to now.

    if you tell me that i promise to actually write something.

    but yea.

    we need to do aldos sometime.

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  2. It's a sad but perhaps true statistic that people don't really keep in touch- that's why I like writing letters because it's one way that shows the recipient that you're still keen on keeping touch. With Facebook, I doubt it's harder to keep in touch, really, but staying close I admit is a different matter. It's sad too that people change... I wonder why we (including I) say we're busy when really if we wanted to we could spend the time to stay close with those we really want to stay close to?

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