Keeping in touch..

[sipi]

As we get older we keep in contact with fewer and fewer friends.

I don't know anyone from my school days, one or two from Uni, and a few from my early working years.

Of course I have made quite a few new friends since, but how many do you keep in touch with from childhood (even with "social media")?

Is there anyone you think "I wonder what he/ she is doing now?"

[sipi]

LOL Trans.

I opened a "facebook" account in my real name (Phil Smith) in the hope of catching up with some old friends, only to receive a message from facebook .."This account is permanently suspended. No-one can have a real name like that"..

It was never meant to be...Fate 555

[sipi]

LOL Trans.

I opened a "facebook" account in my real name (Phil Smith) in the hope of catching up with some old friends, only to receive a message from facebook .."This account is permanently suspended. No-one can have a real name like that"..

It was never meant to be...Fate 555

But I am happy we have been chums for a while now....

Ooooop's, can I say that...........

According to google, I am a Russian classical composer who died in 1547.

[daveAustin]

Sorta, but as have found out, the longer you're away the more you tend to drift from their consciousness, even friends from way way back. Find people 'back home' are not very interested in life outside their peripheral, which is only natural I guess.

[sipi]

Of course. Even my friends who I climbed Mt Everest with in 1985 don't keep in touch.

A tad disappointing, but who cares.

[taotoo]

...my friends who I climbed Mt Everest with in 1985

Tell us more....

[sipi]

...my friends who I climbed Mt Everest with in 1985

Tell us more....

I can't be bothered. Even the photos are fading.

[thaiduncankk]

I had several brothers and sister still in the UK.

We do communicate now and then, but not that often.

One brother, always sends me a text message when someone I knew passes away.

Never bothers to ask me how I am though !

[daveAustin]

Sorta, but as have found out, the longer you're away the more you tend to drift from their consciousness, even friends from way way back. Find people 'back home' are not very interested in life outside their peripheral, which is only natural I guess.

Must admit when l have found folk l talk to them as if we were still rascals...Didn't work...

To me it seems we all get older in different ways, l am not demeaning folk, no, l can only look through my own eyes, gray cells, glad l have stayed young at heart...Not sure about Mrs.Trans thoughts though...

Getting away from the topic, but the problem is (with me anyways) trying to find common ground with folk locked into the booorrring Mon-Fri, 9-5 UK system, where there is F all beyond a Friday night and mindless gossip about, well, people, this or that reality show, who's trodden on who's cat, blah blah. Even educated friends are hard work unless you defer to their world. Unless people have travelled, the connection is always going to be that much smaller and you'll eventually be lost to them. And it's funny, usually turns out I'm the one initiating emails etc... they're in their own little world and we're not, that's it!

[bangkokjulia]

I think with time, it is natural to drift apart. Different lives, different interests etc. My Dad used to say "I don't have many friends, but I know a lot of people."

[StreetCowboy]

When I was six, I had two close friends. I still keep in touch (not so closely) with them both. Both have worked and lived overseas. I keep in touch with several university friends, though I only meet up with a couple, one of whom emigrated to the USA (as did one I am more loosely in contact with).

If you cannot find common ground for discussion with others, that is as much your fault than theirs. If you cannot find common ground for discussion with your peers, because of your experiences, that is your problem, not their's. Perhaps your adventures are less interesting to them than they are to you.

[berybert]

LOL Trans.

I opened a "facebook" account in my real name (Phil Smith) in the hope of catching up with some old friends, only to receive a message from facebook .."This account is permanently suspended. No-one can have a real name like that"..

It was never meant to be...Fate 555

But I am happy we have been chums for a while now....

Ooooop's, can I say that...........

According to google, I am a Russian classical composer who died in 1547.

You have been sadly missed.

[berybert]

Of course. Even my friends who I climbed Mt Everest with in 1985 don't keep in touch.

A tad disappointing, but who cares.

Did you consider this might be your own fault ? Maybe, just maybe if you had bought them back down they might still like you.

[DogNo1]

I think that many renaissance composers are happily missed because of the music that they left behind. Orlando di Lasso and Josquin de Prez would two examples.

[neverdie]

As you get older your friends start to die off, eventually you realise your living on borrowed time.......eventually the grim reaper will come knocking and it will be my time.

In the old days, a mate would move away and you'd either pen a letter or make a telephone call, but the latter option was expensive.

I remember paying, $2-3 per minute and that was back when $2-3 actually bought something.....these days its free.

I have a hand full of friends left.......half of them can't remember their own names yet alone mine.......you start life shittttting in a diaper and if your unlucky you get to finish life doing the same thing.

Friends, they come, they go, such is life.

[optad]

I have 12 friends from school and a 10 or so from university. Uni friends are more eclectic however school friends I am closest to because of commonalities. Now with wives and children it is a massive family and we get together twice a year as a group and many other times bilaterally. It has a self generating energy and we know we are lucky.

However there is much in street cowboy's post above i agree with. Maintaining friendship is a bit like respecting difference as you get older. It is not good enough to just 'be', you need to attend to the smaller things; birthdays, kids names, any of 'their' personal events etc as a cause for contact (effort) and in return you are repaid. I personally find attention to other people "small" things (effort) a healthy life ethic. In principle it is about respect but also diminishes other traits such as arrogance which distances.

[SoiBiker]

Sorta, but as have found out, the longer you're away the more you tend to drift from their consciousness, even friends from way way back. Find people 'back home' are not very interested in life outside their peripheral, which is only natural I guess.

Must admit when l have found folk l talk to them as if we were still rascals...Didn't work...

To me it seems we all get older in different ways, l am not demeaning folk, no, l can only look through my own eyes, gray cells, glad l have stayed young at heart...Not sure about Mrs.Trans thoughts though...

Getting away from the topic, but the problem is (with me anyways) trying to find common ground with folk locked into the booorrring Mon-Fri, 9-5 UK system, where there is F all beyond a Friday night and mindless gossip about, well, people, this or that reality show, who's trodden on who's cat, blah blah. Even educated friends are hard work unless you defer to their world. Unless people have travelled, the connection is always going to be that much smaller and you'll eventually be lost to them. And it's funny, usually turns out I'm the one initiating emails etc... they're in their own little world and we're not, that's it!

With that attitude, I'm not surprised they don't really want much to do with you.

[manfredtillmann]

i have a friend who i shared a room with at boarding school from '73 - '75.

we have spent many days and weeks in each others company since, even once i moved to oz and now thailand we still meet regularly.

as a matter of fact, he only left 6 days ago after spending a week with me (and his new thai gf) up here in issan.

[Jedsada3]

Hello,

We have sisters, brothers, buddies and friends.

We didn't choose our sisters and brothers, they were there when we saw the light or they came later but no one asked us if we want them as sister or brother. Maybe we used to live great moments with them maybe we lived some moments not so... nice. But anyway, if they were part of our lives, it's because we had to live together, there was no way to escape until we or they left the family house. If we keep in touch, maybe it's only because they belong to family. It's written somewhere that brothers and sisters have to keep in touch.

Some brothers and sisters became real friends, some other don't care each other. We shouldn't blame them... they didn't choose each other.

Buddies are people who were part of our lives in a certain period. Their way crossed our way and we had some great moments. When the ways change direction, buddies go. Sometimes, something or some event make that we ask ourselves what they do, where they are but when our eyes look in the other way they disappear again from our toughts.

The friend, the one we found to be our confident, the one we choose to listen to, the one we give everything to without any question, the one we trust blind, the real friend is rare.

And if we have a real friend, we might not hear from him/her for a long time but when we meet him/her, we don't complain about the long silence, we are happy to meet again and we forget everything around us, we are accomplices again. It's like we met yesterday.

Even if you don't keep in touch, a friend remains a friend.

If you don't keep in touch, a sister, a brother or a buddy will be forgoten with the passing time.

Edit: some mistakes corrected

Edited May 16, 2016 by JJA

[Eneukman]

I still meet up with some friends from my school days on visits back home. On my last visit, 5 of us were together for the first time in over 30 years. I also have a few friends from school days as friends on "Facebook".

On my next visit to Scotland next year, with my wife, I'll be visiting Cellardyke (Fife), where my brother still lives to meet up with various friends and relations. In addition, I'll be visiting friends who live near Inverness and Edinburgh where other friends and relations live.

Alan

[mesterm]

I'm still in touch with my best friend from first grade. It's been many decades. I guess we just had too many similar interests. These days communication is mostly on Facebook and all, but we do meet whenever I fly back home and at weddings and so on.

The rest I'm not as interested in visiting. Distant likes on Facebook posts are enough

Edited May 16, 2016 by mesterm

[little mary sunshine]

Always keep in touch,emails,skype,FB. Miss my

Friends, but easy to stay in touch Their Kids have

All grown up, finished University, and are now

Starting families of their own. Old colleagues

Are all retired some still in the same town

Or retired to a warmer climate. I get home

Twice a year and really enjoy our reunions.

Edited May 16, 2016 by little mary sunshine

[bbbbooboo]

As we get older maybe we become less compatible with people we met when we were younger?

[Jeffkp]

I retired and moved here about two years ago. I had several friends I thought were close. We celebrated holiday, birthdays, family events together. I've found that they no longer reach out to me and only respond if I email. When I do, they never ask how I'm doing. Ah well. I've decided to in live the present and enjoy the people I know now in Thailand.

Not bitter, just a fact of modern life. We move on and the past recedes. The didn't even reach out when I won the Nobel Prize for my epic novel "Expats in Love" (available now at better bookstores).

[connda]

I kept in touch with my best friend, until he died of from arrhythmia at the ripe old age of 46. So I kept in touch with him for about 26 years. Everyone else. They drift off into the misty veils of time. I don't attempt to hold on to them. I was brought up as a military brat. I got use to letting go of friends at a very early age. I enjoy them for the moment, I cherish the memories, but attempting to hold on to a fading friendship is simply living in the past. I enjoy my current friends and acquaintances, in the moment. What else do you really need?

[GreasyFingers]

If you do not keep in touch who do you send the jokes and naked women emails to. No good keeping them to yourself

[JHolmesJr]

You need some amount of face-to-face contact and interaction to keep a friendship going…or else it just degenerates into the banality of reminiscence.

[akentryan]

At 77 my address book is filled with deceased written over names and addresses. Half a dozen friends in Pattaya dating back 30 years. Went pub crawling Saturday with one. Attended a 1956 high school class reunion a few years back and am in regular contact with a few friends a year behind. In touch with an old Air Force friend from 1960; he and his wife visited us in Thailand a few years ago. Some family members have visited from the USA over the years with a couple coming next month. Keep in touch with facebook and e-mails and games like Words With Friends. Would be lost without the internet as I have a hearing impairment now.

[facthailand]

I make a major travel & financial effort to visit 87-year old Mum, sister and grown nephews, son and two grandies, daughter and two grandies. We always have a great time together. Eating at table with those with mutual love means everything.

But I should mention this is a one-way street. None of them visit me here, though the time and costs would be identical. I shall be saddened when I'm too old or tired or poor to travel. If there's interest, it will be their turn.

Precious few friend visits and I don't do Fakebook! I do email friends occasionally. When we visit, it's like no time has passed at all. There are some who visit here every year.

For my 25 satang, I think life throws us in the blender to some purpose. Even if you can't travel, don't allow yourself to become estranged from family nor allow them to become estranged from you.

[elgordo38]

I think with time, it is natural to drift apart. Different lives, different interests etc. My Dad used to say "I don't have many friends, but I know a lot of people."

People change over time. A lot of my co-workers when I was working have become standoffish over time. They will bombard me with jokes but not good conversation about how life is treating them. I am a people person often daydreaming off wondering what happened to so and so. Even my new friends can do a weirdo from time to time. I have one that tells me "do not knock on my door I do not answer email me before coming" I also have many gay friends in the building. I also have another friend whom I visit every Sunday that I exchange movies with a great guy with my stories. I always open my door when someone knocks.