Tag: Facebook

Late at Night

You ever put something on Facebook or other social media late at night, and have a friend immediately respond to it? Then you think, what are they doing on the Internet so late at night? As a sidebar, do you also sometimes wish you and that person were actually sitting beside each other so you can have an actual conversation?

There are some who remain your friends regardless of how long it was since you last saw them, and the distance between your homes. Good to know such people are out there.

Want to introduce me to a few?

 

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Old Gangs

Found some of the old gang this week.

Well, one of one ‘old gangs’, this one from my early teen years. I’ve had many old gangs as I traveled the world in a twenty-one year military career, and a few other old gangs as I pursued civilian careers after my military retirement.

This old gang is one of my earliest, formed in formed in Penn Hills, outside of Pittsburgh, PA. We attended school together there at Washington Elementary School, Penn Junior, and John H. Linton, riding the bus, sitting in classrooms, playing baseball and football on fields and streets. I knew them from fifth grade through ninth, and then I left the area. Although I returned, they and I changed, and we never enjoyed the same dynamics and relationships.

I always held them as young people alongside my young self in my mind’s crawl spaces, like home decor that was once loved and used, now set aside, but saved, because someday, I’ll pull that out again. I have tools like that, too. I used to change my cars’ oil, spark plugs, etc, what we used to call ‘giving the car a tune-up.’ These chores had specialized tools. The Porsche used one tool for its oil filter, the Audi, Camaro, Firebird and BMW used other ones. Every time I bought a new previously owned car, I bought a new shop manual and the correct tools. And I never released them back to the wild.

Likewise, I have wires for everything computer and stereo. Printer parallel and serial cables, RCA plugs and jacks in full size and mini, adapters, splits, cable wires, and now, zip drives, mice, keyboards, and fire wires. I guess I’m a collector.

I’ve been looking for my old friends through my family connections, Facebook, Google and other search engines and social media. I wanted to know what each did with their existence, talents and skills, see what they’ve become, what they’ve experienced and accomplished. One finally turned up this week, through his father’s obituary. Astonishingly, that took me directly to my friend’s FB page.

I studied what was shared for a while, confirming it was him. He’d now fifty-nine, but I saw my childhood friend in the hold of his head and the gaze in his eyes. He’d once been a huge comedy fan, outgoing with his inner circle of friends but otherwise shy and withdrawn.

Then he got a puppy, Charlie. Charlie was a small, shaggy black and brown mutt. He loved that dog, and the dog loved him, each exhibiting shining proof in their eyes. Unfortunately, heart worms brought the relationship to an early end, devastating my friend more than Katrina did to New Orleans. He was forced too early to deal with pain and loss, and it fundamentally changed him, something I think about as I watch children cope with historic natural disasters and war zones. Not all react the same to adversity but my friend’s reaction opened a chasm that was never bridged. We came to forks in the road, took different ways, and never saw or heard of one another again.

Until now. It’s nice reaching out to him, and lovely that he’s accepted my FB friend request, but I’ve escaped illusions that we’ll ever be the buddies of childhood. I’ve seen too many changes in myself and other gangs of friends. But my memory of him and our fun and growth in classrooms and summer streets and parks are part of my touchstone of being, so I reach out, to catch a firefly of youth, and watch it glow once more, however briefly it might be.

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Mail Call

  • I want to know what mailing list I’m on that I received personalized advertising for cremation services. Have I just reached ‘a certain age’. I think that’s preferable to believing they have inside information, like foretelling people’s demise.
  • Speaking of being a certain age…I’m sixty now, and I receive a lot less junk mail, other than cremation services. It’s nice, as a ‘younger baby-boomer’ (52-61, according to a recent survey) to finally have the credit card, personal loan et al quite circling like waiting buzzards. Or maybe they have access to the same information, that I’m due to die soon, so they’re taken me off their mailing lists.
  • Isn’t it better to have cremation services junk mail rather than dead skunks and raccoons? A coaching candidate didn’t get the job. He mailed dead skunks and raccoons to the rival that won the job to be a fourth grade teacher and basketball coach. I’m making a snap judgement but if he’s such a sore loser, perhaps it’s better that he’s not coaching fourth graders.
  • Fan mail is always fun, especially when they ooze praise for your writing, how a novel ended, or for general creativity. I don’t get much of this stuff and to receive three in one day, from different people, and they didn’t know me, nor were related, is an astronomical high.
  • One of the weirdest recent developments is using FB to send personal messages. People have email addresses but prefer to go to FB and just click and send via that app, rather than using the more tedious method of typing in names or email addresses. I know, because that’s what I do, given the option. It is easier.
  • Speaking of FB, you can always friend me on Facebook. I admittedly tend to FB much less in recent months. It just became too much of the same thing, whether it’s because of the groups I subscribe to, or FB’s tailoring or privacy and security settings. Either way, I’m tired of dealing with their changing settings. So Friend me! Please. Hah.
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