Photographs

Yesterday, I was fooling around with my computer and my iPad when I ran across old folders of photos.  Since I was in the process of transferring a few from the netbook to the iPad, I wound up scrolling through images I haven't seen in a long, long time.

I looked at places, faces, and events from my past.  I also looked at the dates.  Can it really have been as long ago for some of those things as that number says?  It doesn't seem possible, to be honest.  Yet, I know it must be so because as I looked at some of them, little details that had become blurred came back into sharp focus.

After all of that, at some point in the day, I checked in on FaceBook.  I'm not on there even half as much as I used to be.  I get notifications to my phone, and I find that I'm just not as interested in what happens there unless somebody close to me is having a problem.  I check in once or twice a day now to catch up instead of leaving it running as I used to.  I don't know what that says about my interest in my fellow man, but there you have it.

As I was on FB yesterday, I saw a photo of someone I haven't seen in a long time.  Almost the only contact I have with him these days is through the random FB mention.  He doesn't post much.  I suppose he's too busy with his job and his obligations.  He never has been one for FB, less now than ever.

I looked at the image and thought about how much he's changed, how much he's still the same.   Memories of how we met and the time we spent together made me smile.  His wry sense of humor and quick wit came back to me.  I wished once more that we weren't so far apart, that I could see him again somehow.

One of the crappiest parts of getting older, it seems to me, is that paths tend to split and people who are dear to us tend to wind up going in directions we can't follow.  Even though we intend to "stay in touch" and hold on, life intrudes, and the best of intentions all too often fails.

I think I read an article somewhere talking about how FB completely destroyed the natural life cycle of human relationships.  It said that in previous generations, it was completely normal for people to pass in and out of one's life and be "lost," that every friendship had a life cycle.  If I remember correctly, it sort of accused FB of hindering the rightful deaths of these connections.  At the time I read it, I hated it.  Who has the right to say how long or to what degree a person is important to you?  Should there be an expiration date on how much you care for someone?

Even though I haven't seen him in the real world for a long time, it still brings me joy to know he's out there doing well (better than well, actually).  For some reason, it's a hopeful thing.  We will probably continue to e-talk and make plans to see each other that fall through.  I will continue to be proud to know him from this distance that separates us.  Maybe we will never see each other again except for the images on an online social networking site.  I can't say.

All I know is that seeing that picture made me miss him all over again.