The whole online friend thing is a little odd to me. I mean, it’s great that we are able to stay in touch so easily with the people that we care about and vice versa but, y’know, if you haven’t seen someone since grade 6, chances are that you no longer have the same things in common that you once did. I mean, once you stopped going to school together and you finished your “Transformers rule!” phase, you two probably have nothing really to say to each other.
People seem to have issues with relationships being finite. I, on the other hand, have no problem with the fact that there were people in grade school who I, at the time, considered very dear friends who I no longer talk to. The fact that I no longer stay in touch with them doesn’t de-value the time that I did have with them. A friend doesn’t have to remain constant for him/her to be important. Some of my most valued friends are people who I no longer am in touch with. And all this technology doesn’t really make me want to reach out and re-connect with any of them.
But now I’m in a weird predicament. Because of Facebook I have a bunch of “friends” that I rarely/never talk to. Originally, I was not going to accept a friend request from anyone whom I was not currently friends with . . . but that can’t work. There’s an etiquette about this. If I don’t accept someone as a friend and then a real friend of mine finds out, then I can get into trouble. Hecklers, who are supposed to be my friends, saying things like, “it’s just Facebook. Accept him as your friend and just don’t talk to him if you don’t want to.” That’s what I hear all the time. But my question is: If I’m not going to talk to him (and he probably won’t talk to me) why have him as a friend at all? If this were the real world we would have nothing to do with each other. But for some reason the rules in cyber space are different.
I don’t really know where I’m going with this . . . in fact, I can extend this all the way into the blog world (which I’ve already done previously). People who I don’t talk to on the phone follow me on twitter and my blog . . . what’s up with that? I MEAN . . . * ahem * Thanks to all of you for your interest in what I write!!!!!
So that’s about it for me. I was hoping to work through this a little bit so I could: a) discover why we, as 21st century internet saavy people, care more about our virtual statistics more than what’s happening to the real us and the ones we love in the real world as well as, b) decide whether or not to wish a happy birthday to a person I haven’t seen since summer camp, 1996.
People seem to have issues with relationships being finite. I, on the other hand, have no problem with the fact that there were people in grade school who I, at the time, considered very dear friends who I no longer talk to. The fact that I no longer stay in touch with them doesn’t de-value the time that I did have with them. A friend doesn’t have to remain constant for him/her to be important. Some of my most valued friends are people who I no longer am in touch with. And all this technology doesn’t really make me want to reach out and re-connect with any of them.
But now I’m in a weird predicament. Because of Facebook I have a bunch of “friends” that I rarely/never talk to. Originally, I was not going to accept a friend request from anyone whom I was not currently friends with . . . but that can’t work. There’s an etiquette about this. If I don’t accept someone as a friend and then a real friend of mine finds out, then I can get into trouble. Hecklers, who are supposed to be my friends, saying things like, “it’s just Facebook. Accept him as your friend and just don’t talk to him if you don’t want to.” That’s what I hear all the time. But my question is: If I’m not going to talk to him (and he probably won’t talk to me) why have him as a friend at all? If this were the real world we would have nothing to do with each other. But for some reason the rules in cyber space are different.
I don’t really know where I’m going with this . . . in fact, I can extend this all the way into the blog world (which I’ve already done previously). People who I don’t talk to on the phone follow me on twitter and my blog . . . what’s up with that? I MEAN . . . * ahem * Thanks to all of you for your interest in what I write!!!!!
So that’s about it for me. I was hoping to work through this a little bit so I could: a) discover why we, as 21st century internet saavy people, care more about our virtual statistics more than what’s happening to the real us and the ones we love in the real world as well as, b) decide whether or not to wish a happy birthday to a person I haven’t seen since summer camp, 1996.
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