I opened a group email yesterday that had my cousin's name as the sender. My cousin and I have been pretty tight for most of our lives, right up until the stupid family squabble that neither one of us had anything to do with but still got pulled into. We've been tenuous the last couple of years and it has stunk. The email was actually sent by his wife and it read -
As you may or may not know [RC's cousin] and I have divorced. If you'd like to keep in touch with me here is my new email address.
Then I got home from work tonight and opened another email. This was from my old best friend, my maid of honor when we got married. We had drifted apart before we left California, but it's been really bad since we've been here. I hear from her on birthdays and Christmas and know she's gotten married in the last few years. Well, this was a bunch of pictures from a vacation and I didn't know a soul in them. I can only assume she was taking them. But there were kids - two of them - and the last I heard she didn't have any kids. Are they her husbands? Adopted? Vacationing friends?
Tonight was Bunco night, the one night a month I get together with a group of long-term good friends. I'd been looking forward to it. Then today work called and asked if I'd be interested in working tonight. I said no. They said what about for double time pay? I said no - I had plans.
Then I hung up the phone and started thinking about all the money that has gone out this week and I called them back and said ye$, I $ure would be intere$ted in working a night $hift. So all my friends got together and had a great time and I bowed to the almighty dollar. Whee.
Why is it so easy to lose touch these days? And why do I feel so out of the loop? I adore my cousin and am hurting for him. (And his wife for that matter). I miss my friend in California and would like to know who all these new people in her life are. I feel bad that I chose money over friendship tonight, even while I don't see that I had a huge choice.
I emailed my cousin and his (ex) wife and got a response tonight. I'll contact my friend and ask all the questions I can think of. Tomorrow I'll make a few phone calls and collect all the Bunco dirt. It'll all come out in the wash.
So why do I feel like I'm living in a bubble? Is it just me?
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
out of the loop
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26 comments:
heck no, it's not just you. when i state that i have no friends, i mean just that. i haven't seen my best friends from h.s. since mid 90's. i feel so bad for neglecting people and then definitely losing touch because they've moved or i've moved and never bother notifying each other. i wish i had friends here, but i don't. i know right off if i'll be friends with someone or they'll just be an acquaintance. unfortunately or fortunately, depending on who you ask, i don't like people very much these days lol so that could be a reason i have no friends lol
Nope, definitely not just you. Part of it is ordinary busy-ness. Another part of it is the ease of technology, you always figure you'll be able to catch up soon so you don't have to work too hard at it. I am very guilty of letting emails sit in my inbox for weeks.
I hear from my youngest brother maybe 3 or 4 times a year. We used to be very close and it makes me sad that we talk so seldomly now.
Sounds like you have a game plan for getting back in the loop - good luck with it.
Maybe we're all just growing up.
What a dreadful thought!
no I think as you get older it just happens. People move on, move away. I have troble talking to my brothers ad they're only a few hundred miles away! And people are always so busy nowadays...
It is really easy to lose touch - I have, unfortunately, with so many friends. We send/receive xmas cards and that's about it. You've spurred me on RC to make an effort and contact those friends. Thankyou. x
No, it's me too. We have more means of communication today than ever before and yet we seem to communicate less and less.
well, you know, it's all the things that have listed above, plus one more: energy. a person only has so much energy, RC. you have a demanding job, three spirited kids, a house, a husband, and a need for a certain amount of time for yourself. you also have 24 hours in a day.
sometimes, even if you physically could fit in a phone call or a visit with an old friend, you just lack the emotional energy for it.
i think when you get past the kids-at-home stage, friends come back into the forefront. but for now? there's only so much of You to go around.
I agree with Flowerpot, people are always so busy nowadays.
It certainly isn't just you, I'm exactly the same. You would think it would be easier these days to keep in touch with people - with email, Facebook and text messaging, but still I have lost contact with dozens of friends, I should phone relatives more often. There just doesn't seem to be the time. It takes a lot of effort which I'm willing to put in, the problem is I have very little free time. I expect its the same with many busy parents trying to juggle everything.
Easier communication (mobiles, e-mails, skype etc), does not necessarily = easier communication. Sadly.
I think it is just trying to have and/or do it all. My mother was best friends with our next door neighbor. Every single afternoon, while we kids were doing our homework, Mom went over to Lucy's and had coffee and they chatted. Lucy's husband was incapacitated in a construction accident so Mom went there every day instead of reciprocal visiting. Mom knew that her friendship was valuable and made sure to make time for it. I think we just get bogged down in the busy-ness of the average day and forget to prioritize our mental health into it. I am glad you are touching base again with your old friends and your current friends? They'll understand the need to pay bills!
nope all of my friends are scattered now throughout the state i lived in and another state, and really, i dont get to see them at all. all my family is away, well, we are away from all our family. my hubby has a good job, but he can use some flex time, so he can work 10 hours for 4 days and have all day friday off if he wants, so we can go visit, but if i have a job, there's no way i could have that flexibility, so we'd be stuck with an all night drive on a friday night, and leaving early on sunday, and we'd still both be exhausted on monday to go back to work. i'm taking the winter off of work, and that helped, we were able to have more time off and to rest up because i didnt work. but i probably should get a job in the spring. that just means if we do visit, it wont be very pleasant, it wont be enough time, we'll be tired, etc.. it doesnt seem fair. and it seems like i do ALL of the trying to keep in contact.
I think it is a universal problem. It is easy to keep in contact with people you see everyday. People start to fade away when you lose the natural daily contact.
I told one friend, "You are allowed to move away, but not fade away." We still talk pretty frequently, but we don't do stuff together anymore. Without the ability to spontaneously get together, we often can't manage.
Oh sweeite. It's just impossible to do everything isn't it? I think the email to your friend, AND THE ONES YOU'VE ALREADY SENT WILL BE PERFECT, AND THEY'LL KNOW YOU CARE. And I didn't mean to go all shouty, but I'm off out so no time to retype. xx
I know exactly what you mean. I made a wonderful friend at work during my first real job. Before I had kids, I did a great job of getting together with her. I even did pretty well after my first was born. There are pictures of our girls together at the holidays even though by then we lived five hours from one another. We moved back, and I saw her for lunch every couple of months to catch up. That stretched to every six months or so, and the last time I saw her it was by accident at a department store. It was so odd. We were almost like strangers. Life just gets in the way.
No - and No - and No again - it's not just you...
It is so, so not just you. I have the same problem, and I'm a stay-at-homer for goodness' sake.
Facebook has helped a lot though.
Life is too big these days,
That's the real trouble.
Lots of people cope by
Living in a bubble.
So don't feel bad about it.
If it weren't for facebook, I wouldn't know anything about anyone. Honestly. And I haven't been working!
It's hard to keep in touch, particularly when there is distance between you and your friends.
Global village, my ass.
Oh! By the way, Mikayla's mum said to suggest your son's friend's mum try out the chat rooms at childrenwithdiabetes.com - she said it's how she got through the first year with Mikayla, and also said if the Mum needs someone to talk to to pass along her email - so if that's something she'd like, just email me. *mwah*
No, it's not you. I've lost track of a ton of people who live in the same city as me. At least your don't live in the same state? I don't know, it sounds better to me anyway.
We're still friends with the people who live in our neighborhood that we've known since highschool. Until we moved into their neighborhood we had lost them too. At least you have a plan for popping your bubble! That's something.
Great post. It isn't just you....I am there. I am so sunk into my own little world sometimes....I come up for air...and it is a new season. sigh...
I probably can't add anything to what's already been said here, but no, it's not just you.
I feel like I've been drifting through a haze of work, TFYO school, and baby stuff for the last couple of months. I hate it, because I feel like a bad friend, and a bad relative, and too wrapped up in my own goings on to look up and notice everyone else.
Arrgh! How do we pull ourselves out of this?
They obviously don't know about your blog, if they did you'd all be in touch.
I hate that email and text messaging is the only way we can communicate with each other, forget about showing any real emotions. I like to write, I sometimes don't like to talk about what is going on, but I always try and keep people utd. But the very same thing happened to me. I got an email from a Melissa and a last name I didn't know. Well come to find out that in a year and a half since we spoke, she had divorced her husband of 13 years and remarried. HUH? Ok, whatever makes you happy.
FYI- My mom's signature on her email is
BE FLEXIBLE AND U NEVER GET BENT OUT OF SHAPE!
CIAO...XO
Please don't apologize for going after the almighty *&^%$*&^ dollar! Each person at Drunko TOTALLY understood after I told them after EACH and EVERY person asked where you were. You were very much missed, but please- we all would have made the same choice.
I think its so easy to get caught up in our lives, im terrible at keeping in touch with people - have real phone fear which means talking on the phone is out.
I really hope you manage to re connect with your friends
All I can say is ditto. It is amazing in this age of easy communication how we lose touch with people.
I am so lucky to have kept 2 of my best friends -- a friend from 8th grade who has the same birthday, and a friend I met in 1973. We still stay in touch, even though we may not see each other often.
No, it's not just you.
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