Missing Friends

In the last few months, pretty much since I started going through old pictures to try my hand at scrapbooking, I have been thinking more and more of missing friends. Some that I have lost forever, some that just somehow drifted away over the years.

Facebook has been a great thing for getting back in touch with old friends. I can't believe the number of people I have "found" again through FB. Yet, FB also has some drawbacks. There must be some contest I don't know about to have the highest number of friends on FB, because sometimes I am totally confused as to why these people want to "friend" me. They are friends of friends or siblings of friends or people I have never even heard of who have no "mutual" friends so I don't know how they found me.

Then there is what I have come to think of as the "High School Hang-up." I wasn't the geekiest person at my school but I wasn't the most popular either. When I look back, I think I have had a pretty successful and surely happy life in the 18 or so years since I graduated high school. Yet, somehow, being on FB and seeing people I graduated with "friending" my siblings or other friends instead of me brings back all those old HS insecurities. Do they just not like me? Why don't they like me? WHY DO I CARE? Yet, I do. So I have been avoiding Facebook like an insecure high school freshman. Hopefully, I will get over it soon, because I really do like FB....

I have also used the internet (mostly Google) to find some old friends. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I have been pleasantly surprised at the response I have gotten from some long-lost, missing friends I have managed to track down. Now, I just have to keep in touch!

Then, there are those missing friends that are truly gone forever. Today marks one year since I lost my friend Carrie and her son Lucas. Today I talked with another friend who was also good friends with Carrie and we just spent some time reminiscing and missing Carrie. Sometimes it is hard to remember that Carrie wasn't perfect; there were so many good things about her. She was a great friend who truly cared about others - often doing little things just to show you how much she cared and that you were thought of; she was a great mother - she loved Ashley and Lucas so much, you could tell just being around her that they were her world; she was a good wife - (though Jim would be the better judge on that) when I stayed with them for two months, it was easy to see how important it was to her to make a good home for him, to support him and how much she loved him. The main thing I will always remember about Carrie was her love of life - she was ALWAYS moving, always doing something. Sometimes she thought of it as a flaw, that she couldn't slow down or sit still...but she was able to fit so much into her way too short life. She touched so many people who are changed forever for knowing her.

While I know I can never be exactly like Carrie, nor should I want to be for I am my own person, I do hope that I continue to grow in my love for others and learn to care more about showing love than worrying about what others may think.

I guess part of that will be continuing to search for those other missing friends and keeping in touch with those I have found. Being a good friend is probably the best legacy I can think of to remember Carrie.