Sometimes You Just Know

I was driving up to East Lansing to see my therapist the other day and was thinking, once again, about how fortunate I’ve been in the last number of months. Reconnecting with so many people, chatting with them daily, be it online, by phone or in person. It’s brought so many things into my head that, like I’ve stated on numerous occasions, it becomes quite overwhelming. Something that really hit me while driving is how young we all still are. Imagine our parents at this age doing and talking about the things we do.

I told my therapist that I had an epiphany on the drive. I said it suddenly hit me why I really like this whole Facebook thing. I said it’s a lot like High School and I never participated in these games that are so prevalent on the site way back when. What I mean by that is not to say I was above that kind of thing, I just never hung around the school. I wasn’t popular by any stretch of the imagination and, I am here. It’s a nice feeling. Granted, it’s all kind of a fluke. By that I mean that it’s a great deal easier to spew out my thoughts or comments from here in my chair than it would be in person. If I had just started showing up places without knowing these people I doubt I’d have said a word. This way they’ve gotten to know me, and I them, long before I have to put on that face we all put on when we are out and about.

The relationships I’ve developed on Facebook are almost like when you start having a crush on someone. You know how that goes, there’s nothing anyone can say about the one you’re falling for that could possibly make you feel any less enamored of them. After a while that feeling fades and faults are found. The goal here is to keep those faults hidden long enough so those that are close feel they’ve invested too much to just go away. I know I’ve thought about what could happen when the newness of all of this wears off and I sincerely hope the relationships developed continue on.

Going back to the high school reference, as more and more people have hopped on the Facebook train, certain cliques have developed. 30 years ago the only clique I felt I could possibly fit into was that of the few friends I had that wouldn’t think any less of me for just getting high and watching television, certainly not the popular group. Here, on Facebook, I’m in that popular clique. I’ve actually found myself not talking to some simply because they aren’t part of said clique. That’s horrible I know but like I said, it’s just like being back in school. I’ve become friends with people, outside of the Internet, that certainly weren’t friends with me years ago.

It’s kind of like redemption for me in a way. As a teen, I would see the people that were a year or two older and wonder why we couldn’t hang out together, be friends, confide in each other. I always thought that I had something that could interest them. Most, if not all these kids were friends with my brothers. That alone, as kids, is more than enough of a reason for me not to belong in their circle of friends. As one gets older, age makes those sibling complications disappear. Just getting older has given me this redemption I believe I have been seeking all these years. I had such a hard time understanding it back then and, yes, it feels good to be proven right, as it were.

Like I said at the top, I feel so lucky to have this virtual world to live in right now. I’ve got friends, literally, around the world because of it. I have had numerous conversations with people who have downplayed their use of Facebook as just something to pass the time. I feel far different than that. I have told many of you and I will continue to say that Facebook has changed my life. I have developed close relationships with so many people that the normal life I’d lived for the past five years has made a complete circle. I go out on a regular basis, never did that before. I look forward to my time away from work just to be able to socialize with friends, never did that before either. This is very real to me and I can’t repeat enough how much it has done for me inside.