one of the things about growing up is that friends will often move away. 
heck, sometimes *you'll* move, esp. if you're going to college 
somewhere else. do you keep in touch with these friends? are there
people you wish you'd kept in touch with from your chilhood? do you
think about these old friends often?

103 responses total.

One friend I really wish I'd kept in touch with was this kid named Mark
who just moved to some backwater hick town in the middle of south dakota
or something.
I just met him a few years ago, and we were pretty tight, but then one day,
he split, and I didn;t get any addresss.

Friends tend to come and go, as long as you know...
or something like that.

Seriously now...


I've had too many people who said they were my friends just fade right out of
my existence.  It's traumatic to say the least.
I always hope that my TRUE friends will never fade, but I've only recently
found a few true friends and I haven't really known them long enough
to see if we are friends enough, or true enough friends, to keep our friendship
from fading.  Those few I consider true friends... I hope they feel the same
and would like to be friends for a long long time.

I've had my best friend sinxce we were seven years old.  She left a lovely
Thanksgiving message on my answering machine yesterday while I was gone...
she saw the Opelika Marching Band on the Thanksgiving Parade and wanted 
me to know she was thinking of me...:)
The friends I've really been attached to, I still have.  I regret--
REALLY regret--losing touch with some of my friends after high school, 
when I moved 800 miles away from home and missed out on a lot of their lives. 
Hopefully I will be able to find them someday.  It's happened.  
It's harder to keep in touch with people the longer they're gone, and the
further apart you are.  But it's well worth the effort, and I'm glad I 
have made it.   We get a lot of laughs over how much we've changed over the 
years.  I'd like to be old someday and look back on some lifelong 
friendships.

        I think of some of my pre-school friends from time to time, and
realize that I cant't even remember their names.  For all I know, I may be
friends with some of them again and not even know it.
        The first friends I have really specific memories of were my
friends in Kindergarten, in CAlifornia.  I sill have fond memories of all
those people, and wonder what they would be like if I went back to Palo
Alto to look for them.  I haven't seen any of them since my return to Ann
Arbor right before the start of first grade. 
        The friends I still see, but do not really associate with anymore,
are those from early elementary school.  Some of them I don't see anymore,
and some of those I do see I am still friends with, but for the vast
majority of them, the friendships have died down a little as our interests
have diverged.  It's kind of sad, since I realize that some of thes
epeople who were really good friends then are right there and I don't
really know anything about them now.
        Another group of friends that I have gotten completely seperated
from are my friends from my year in England.  I had some really strong
friendships there, but it's still kind of hard for fourth graders to keep
up a friendship when seperated by a few thousand miles of water.  I keep
hoping to see some of them show up on Grex, but I haven't seen that yet.

I really don't know about keeping friends for a long time.  I feel like I've
changed so much at college because when I came back, I went to see a movie
with two of my friends from high school (I guess not that deep friends, non
of them were) and it was like, they were shocked that I thought "Dragon" was
a totally awesome movie (saw it again a few months ago, it was great!) it
wasn't just that, but that and other things made me feel like we had totally
diverged. Now I wonder about my friends at college, one of them who I thought
would be lifelong is feeling more distant, and another, well I get a strong
feeling that I'll never totally lose contact with her.  I don't know, I tend to
think that in some respects long-term friends (of which I've had close to none)
 are probably good, but you can also find a lot of cool things with new
friends, a lot in common, etc.  Of course where you draw the line between
long-term and recent is an  interesting discussion of itself...

Well, to start, this is Treelawn but he's in party right now and I'm to lzy to
log back on..
        I've had many friendships that have seemed to just drop away into
        nothing, usually very suddenly.  Most of these have happened in
        transitions from schools, but the biggest have happened for really no
        reason that I can find. The first friend I lost was from Nursery School
        believe it or not
.  We were best friends from really since we were born, we lived a few streets
away. When I was four, we were four, he moved to Marquette.  I was to young to 
realize what was happening, and I really made new friends very quickly.   Not
until recently when his mother started taking classes at the UofM during summer
vacations did we really meet again.  This past summer his mom didn't  take
classes so we weren't really together, he spent a week with me at my house
which was great fun.  But he's really a friend, a true friend that I've
somewhat lost.  Recently I got a bad letter from him concerning his life etc,
and I just feel so  bad that I cannot be there to help him.
        Other friendships I've had have faded from school to schools, 
suddenly I'm not in the same classes, and we slightly fade away.  Worse in
the middle school-high school transition because many good friends go to
a different school now.  
        Well now you've had a lovely look into my life, I guess friends
are really something we have to honor because if we don't pay attention to them
they deteriorate (sp
[A)?..

Well most of the friends I've made this summer I still talk to.....
and I've had one friend for about 7 years now......

I've never moved, and I've never had very many friends.....

I have a few friends I've really managed to keep up with, Sunny for one. Even
when she moved to Ann Arbor we kept in touch.  Some of my 'best friends' from
elementary schools I've totally lost touch with.  I'm sort of sad when I lose
friends, or when they just fade from my life- but I realize that we have all
just grown apart, and there's nothing I can do about that.  As we grow older
we change, and that means we will develop lives and interests that our friends
may not share, and just drift away.  I've kept in contact with some friends
from high school, and I'm glad of that.  They were my good friends, and even
though I have made new friends in college, I wouldn't trade the old.

I don't have a lot of friends left over from elementary school. There's
Anita, but we weren't really friends until high school. There's a friend
of mine named John Beatty. We tend to go a couple of years before running
into each other. I think he'll always be a friend, but we've moved beyond
the point where we could be close. Many of the people who were my friends
from early elementary school *did* move away, and during elementary
school at that. 

These days, my friends are mostly those I've made in high school or those
I've made in the years since. I've managed to stick with many of the
friends I'd made my freshman year, and I'm glad for that. It was one of
the more trying times in my life, and these friends are people who cared
then and continue to care now.

most of my friends from when i lived in illionois i remember, but i wonder if
they remember me.  there is one friend there that i have stayed in contact
with, but i know that i haven' talked to her in over 8 months.  most of you
know lynne.  she and i have been inseperable since third grade.  the 
true friends that i have had have mostly stuck with me, but there are a
few that have wandered off into the mists.  there was one person that was
like a twin to me (and actually a cousin, we found out one day!) who
decided to let her life go to hell.  she now hangs around smoking acid and
other nasties.  i really wish that i could have kept ehre.

Interesting way of phrasing that.

what was so interesting about the phrasing?

It suggested to me that sometimes shit happens.
Go forward.

sorry, I know it's obscure.  but it just made me think of that was all.

re #10....I know how you feel.  My closest friend growing up was a year
younger than me and when I left for college, he started to do a lot of
pot and crack....I'd go home and we'd go out drinking, but I'm not into the
drug scene at all!  Despite the fact he got a 30 on the ACT, he had
a 0 GPA his first semester at the University of Illinois, was kicked
out of there and then went back to the community college at home
where he proceeded to get a 0 GPA there too (he stopped caring about 
showing up for class).  He's now working at a Cracker Barrel at home
and the last time I talked to him, he thought that college was a waste
of time and had no desire to go back...it was tough for me to let go, 
and it took me a long time to understand that things had changed, but
I guess it's the dark side of growing up......(this was hard to read, wasn't
it?)

I have friends who used to be hella rad, and now they spend all their time
doing drugs.
Curtis, I miss ya, man.

I was watching tv the other day ans two WB bunnies said the secret to life was
FRIENDS... that hit me like a ton of bricks in grade school I was the
minority...  in my class I was one of four non-locals. ans I cought a lot
offlack from that and have not really bounced back yet.  My best friend for the
first 7 years was  the class clown and a really fun person but he moved a way
and we have not talked since.. for the next 3-4 years Jesse Jannetta..some of
you might know him... was my best friend..  he was  a really smart kid who did
a lot with me and one day he had to move.. we tryed to keep it up but after a
week trip togeter toa camp we never talked again... untill 5 months ago..I
called him ....but It was too late and we have growen apart

really gets to me ... if the secret to life is friends and I can not make them
then I must be fucked....  :( but at least I have my old high school friends
and maybe time will alow me to slowly meet new people who will really want to
be my friends.

The secret to life having MEANING is friends.
I went and saw someone today.  It meant a lot to me.
I also went and saw (again) Interview With the Vampire and
then Star Trek: Generations.  I enjoyed the movies, but I went alone,
and somehow, without a friend.... it's not worth very much really.

money is nothing if you don't have friends and loved ones to spend it on.  ;:) 

 
I just wish friends were like water... when ever you need one all you have to
do is turn them on .  and when your full you just have to turn them off( ask
them to leave .. not rudly or anything)

i'm lucky...for the most part, my friends are like that!  :)

you are lucky
be sure to keep them and be the friend back to them that they are to you....

I never made a lot of friends until high school.  I still don't have MANY.  
I was an asshole in my early years.  Just ask dang.  Fortunately for my 
concept of self-worth, I don't remember many of them.  I don't make friends
very well, but I treasure the ones I have.  The only thing I can think of in
my life that is more important to me than my friends is my relationship w/God.
I suppose you could say that He's a friend, too, but it's a little more than
that.  Anyway.  Not even my family is as important to me as my friends.  I 
don't think I even do it consciously.  I just always seem to have enough
time for them.  I like that part of myself.  I have never really lost any
friends.  There are some that I have grown apart from, simply because I
matured and they didn't, but I have never had anyone really important to
me just up and move out of reach.  The closest to that was when lynne
moved to chicago for college, but she still visits, and she is still on
grex.  I think that while friends may not be the only meaning to life,
they are certainly one of the good parts.  

Exactly

I have a friend named Kathleen who moved to Florida a little over two 
years ago. We keep in touch by letters but we would really like to see
each other in person. We are more than friends, though neither of us
have ever readily admitted it. I think we're both afraid they might just
be misunderstandings of what we say or do.

you only live once
Do what you want to with her and besure you HAVE fun
....being call "just a friend" when you feel more really hurts over time
you are betteroff being honest

okay...I've seen myself mentioned at least twice in this one so far...now
it's my turn (heheheh!)  Anyway...
I tend to be fairly aloof, and don't make friends very easily.  However,
the friends I do make are generally extremely close...I can't tell you
how upset I was to be going off to college and leaving all my friends,
especially since I find it hard to open my mouth around people I don't
know (except how do you ever get to know new people if you don't open your
mouth around them et cetera).  I'm happy to say that I still feel fairly
comfortable around all my high school friends, although I regret being
somewhat out of the loop.  I think I can safely say that I've only grown
apart from three friends who I really felt close to.  The first one was
my preschool friend from the time I was about three...we were inseparable
until she moved away when I was five or six.  I think m mother tried to get
her new address, but even I (good old modest me) wasn't up to having a peen
er, pen pal at age five.  I almost never think about her, since the next
year we moved to new jersey and when I look back I remember the move much
more clearly.  I wonder what happened to her?  :(
The next good friend I lost was "best friends" with eeyore and I from 
fifth grade onward, although the three of us spent a good deal of junior
high being mad at each other.  She went to Community and I guess her life
just took a different path from ours.  It always makes me feel weird when
I see her.   We had some really good times together.  The third friend
wasn't all that important to me, Iguess...but I still wish I was better
at maintaining relationships!
which reminds me...I haven't called eeyore from oregon yet...
thanks, all of you who acutally read through this long!

Who was the friend who went to Community?

Anne Gray.  do you know her?  she would have graduated last year, I assume.

I sort of knew her.

the other day I saw one of my old kindergarten classmates while
shopping. It's sort of strange because we've drifted apart a
bit as far as our friendship goes, but there's still a bond
there. We chatted a bit about our old classmates (he's kept
better track of them than I).

A couple o' days ago I saw a bunch of my pre-school buds on the same day.
It was weird, they weren't together, they were just around. I realized how 
most of them turned out the same, but I turned out REALLY different from all
of them. They all became really social, whereas I just became like a bookworm
and read a lot, and got into weird music, like japanese noise bands and stuff.
Oh well. ITs crazy how things are.

When I met lynne a couple of years ago, my mom said she remembered her,
remembered her mom, etc., 'cause apparently we went to preschool together.
 My memory doesn't go that far back.  I drifted apart from my elementary
school friends, for the most part... there's one girl who I was good
friends with through about third grade who goes to Pioneer and has classes
with me this year.  It's really strange, because she tries to act as if
we're still good friends, and a LOT has changed since then... we're very
different people.  I don't really have any friends that have been friends
for a long time.  Most of my friends now are people I've met during high
school.  I worry a bit about keeping in touch with them after we all
graduate and go our separate ways.  I'm fairly optimistic... we can all
e-mail each other, at least... and these things do last.  I recently saw
one of my dad's high school friends who came to visit.  I'd met her
several times before, and she and my dad are still good friends... but she
lives out in California now, and they only write each other now and then,
and it's not quite the same.  

One of my frinds from high school called me the other day.  She wants us
to get together and do something... it's weird, because I know how different
we both are now.  I kinda of want to see her, but then I remember that I
didn't really like her much in high school.  I probably will see her, but
things will be so strange.

<sigh.>  Growing pains.

That's a dumb show.
I can't go see anyone from school.
At least I couldn't talk to them about my life...  I'd be shunned
and thought of as less than nothing.
Religious schools.  I dunno.

a few days ago we got a letter from a neighbor of ours that had moved away 8
months ago.  they had a son that i was pretty good friends with in elemantry
school, but he dropped out in 10th grade, and i basically haven't seen him 
since.  when we got the letter from his parents, i started wondering what  ]had
happened to him, and then ran into him yesterday!  it was kinda funny...

also ran into another frined from jr. high that i  haven't seen in a while.
it was good to talk to her, but it was fairly obvious why we had grown 
apart.

It happens, I guess.
Move on.

You have to be pretty lucky to find a "forever frined." Friends come,
friends go. Friends move, friends stab you in the back. In reality, you're
only "forever friend" is yourself. I come to accept that after many years
of trying to make a good friend. But the same things always happen:
Friends come, friends go...

I have one friend from pre school that I stgill run into occasionally.  I
still know him because our parents became friends too, so I saw him over
the years.  As for the rest of my pre school friends, I may know some of
them quite well now and not even know that I knew them before.  The one I
talked about earlier is the ony one whose name I can remember.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss