So lately I have been feeling a bit sad. I love my life and the way things have turned out for me. (well in most aspects.) I am healthy, have a wonderful loving husband, a good family (well most of em), a job (that I dont like but at least I have one!) and wonderful friends. For some reason, I have been very nostalgic though.
Recently a friend from high school and a friend from college both got married. We keep in touch via facebook a tiny bit so I knew that I wouldn't be invited to the wedding or anything like that but I was excited to see the pictures! (Since I am a wedding dork and think I missed my calling as an event planner..anyway....back on track.) I found myself feeling very sad to see that a large portion of my friends (from both times in my life) were in attendance at these weddings. I felt like, how come I lost touch with all of these people and they all stayed in touch so well? Is it me? Am I a bad person? Did they not care about my friendship? Did I not care enough about their friendships? I have been really struggling with this and wish that I would have been a better friend.
I know that people change and drift a part and a large part of this was that they all moved to manhattan and I moved out to guam on Long Island. Don't get me wrong, I love my friends now and wouldn't trade them in for anything in the world but I kind of feel sad that I have only a couple of people that I keep in touch with from High School and College.
The thing is, I know if I saw them all out it would be a great time and I wouldnt feel funny or anything but I feel liek it's too late to really 'rekindle' old friendships. Does that make sense? Am I losing it? I very well might be! Anyone else have similar feelings like this?
halfbaked
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
You are not alone!! I think about this a lot since my best friend from high school is still friendly with everyone else we went to school with and I'm not really. We are all still friendly and we see each other randomly and keep in touch on facebook but that's it and I feel like that's not a REAL friendship.
For me, I think a lot of it has to do with getting kicked out of high school in my senior year. They all got to graduate together and go to prom and do all those things together and I was alone. I mean I made friends at my new school but it was hard. Walking in there, I did not know a single other person and everyone had grown up together and was already so close.
I think you should contact some of them! Maybe put together a BBQ or something like that and get the old group back together. Maybe they'll be more inclined to come if it's a group of them. Maybe some of them are even feeling like you are!
Don't think you're a bad person though, you just made different choices!
julesrbf
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
Posted by MrsDrinkh20
The thing is, I know if I saw them all out it would be a great time and I wouldnt feel funny or anything but I feel liek it's too late to really 'rekindle' old friendships. Does that make sense? Am I losing it? I very well might be! Anyone else have similar feelings like this?
NEVER EVER too late!
I look back on lots of friendships that have slipped by the wayside and am sometimes sad about that ... but life is constantly changing, as is geography, life circumstances, priorities ... LIFE! It's life. Don't feel so sad about it ... if they are friendships that just sort of lost touch, and you miss the people in question ... then it's never too late to rekindle (or at least try)!
Always try to remember the good times you had with these people and look back with fondness instead of sadness!
little j
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
i actually went thru this not that long ago. one of my very good friends from HS was getting married. (she moved to PA so after soph year of college we lost touch aside from FB, but i didnt really 'know her' anymore).
i was surprised when she sent me an invite for her bridal shower. andd i remember posting on the 2010 boards if i should even go. i was happy i did, i went to her wedding, and invited her to my shower and wedding. aside from that we still havent really gotten together. and, for me, it is ackward when we do see eachother, cuz i just wanna scream 'WHY DONT WE TALK AS MUCH ANYMORE???' lol
so moral of the story (if i even have one), invite them out!!!! sometimes it just needs one person to build that bridge or make that call.
honestly, if my friend didnt invite me to her shower/wedding, i probably wouldnt have invited her because i would have put her in the 'old friend' category. but she was my bff at one point and even tho we dont talk alot, im so glad she was there and we got to celebrate with eachother.
there are other HS friends that have drifted, and one i recently saw and made an effort by telling her we should meet up. but did she contact me? no. she is in her 'own world' and she was the one that detached from a lot of us.
so i say, make the effort. worst case is that you are still just FB friends. best case, you rekindle friendship, and somewhere in the middle (the most likely), you have a really fun day with some old friends!
gina409
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
i agree with the girls...its never ever too late!!!!!
im sure they would love to meet up with you and catch up on old times!!!!!
i had 2 friends that i knew growing up..we were best frends till we moved to middle village when i was 10..i had not seen them in years and through fb we all got talking and had lunch one day and it was soooo good to see them!!!!!
i think you should give it a try..i really think it will be fun!!!
FutureCap
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
Remember this... you really get a handful of truly wonderful, i would do anything for you, amazing friends in life who remain an huge part of your life. And even some of those people are not close by... in know. Many of my closest friends still live in the city and queens and its just hard to see them and I miss them so much. I even get jealous of DH (not in a bad way) cause all his best friends live withing 2-5 minutes of us and we see them every wknd. I love them all and even have become close with their wives, one was even a bridesmaid! I am lucky to have gained all of them as friends... but I miss my own friends too and wish we could see each more!
JennyAPH
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
I know how you feel hun. All of my friends from Highschool all are still friends and I see them all together in pictures on facebook etc. I am friendly with them through facebook but nothing more. I feel the same way as you.. I always wonder what I could have done differently... but then I also know I love my life and my friends now and am glad it worked out this way.
Don't feel sad.. you still have ME!!!!!!!
MrsDrinkh20
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
Posted by JennyAPH
I know how you feel hun. All of my friends from Highschool all are still friends and I see them all together in pictures on facebook etc. I am friendly with them through facebook but nothing more. I feel the same way as you.. I always wonder what I could have done differently... but then I also know I love my life and my friends now and am glad it worked out this way.
Don't feel sad.. you still have ME!!!!!!!
I love that I still have YOU!!
But that's exactly how I feel...I guess I got so swept up in my life with DH that I didn't put any energy into my old friends. And it just makes me a bit sad to see them all still hangngout and having fun together.
But I am VERY lucky to have the friends and people in my life that I do now!
I lost touch with alot of people from HS and college. It's definitely not to late to rekindle old friendships. And don't let the distance turn you off. They may want to reconnect with you and they won't be turned off that you live in LI and they live in Manhattan (it's not like it's across the country). I would give it a try!
FuTuRe MrS MaZz
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
As Mrs. Pessimistic, while I think its great to rekindle friendships from back then, just be prepared for the possibility that friends do go off in diff directions and could totally end up being your complete opposite now... A longgg time ago, I did this with an ex and another friend only to find out we no longer had much in common and with the friend, I actually shed some tears because of the relaization that it wasnt the friendship that I remembered having... I actually felt worse after all this and kinda wished i has left it all in the past....
But on the flip side, I do have a friend from HS who I see maybeeee once every 2 yrs... She came to my bridal shower and the next time I saw her again was just this past weekend!! She is the type of friend where we always pick up right where we left off...
So my bottom line to this long story is to be careful who you chose to rekindle friendships with... try to find out if you're both still on the same page before setting yourself up for disappointment like I did...
Summertimegal424
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
friends come and go, but you true best friends will stick around forever.....
it TOTALLY stinks because i feel the same way at times about old friends and unfortuntley i have reached out to them again to try to re connect and we start to re kindle and then things slip away again
VickiR510
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
Dont think that way. Its never too late. In fact just recently some really old firends & i have gotten back in touch & its really great. Of course though my other (amazing) friends are always invited to meet my new friends & because my friends are so cool & awesome they want to come & meet them. So im loving it. I have wonderful friends from every time in my life.
pandafish519
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
i have been in the same position. a lot of my friends from college i've had a hard time keeping in touch with. we'd gotten back in touch a little more and we are loving it. i 100% feel your frustration with it all. you are a wonderful person. and like you said, you have incredible friends. i'm a firm believer that people are in your life at a certain time for a reason. don't beat yourself up!!!
ETA: i spoke with one of my friends recently about how our friendship kind of fell apart. we both felt SO much better talking about it and we both recognized that there are a lot of reasons why things fall apart and no one really is to blame. it just happens ya know?
MrsInglima
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
I feel like that sometimes too, even with some of my best friends when we don't talk for awhile. I think it's normal to miss past parts of your life as long as it doesn't completely consume you. One thing I often tell myself, though, is that a lot of times you miss the TIME and it's really hard to recapture that since you leave the environment and people do change. I say if you're really intent on getting back in touch with these people you should start trying to get in contact again otherwise leave it as a happy memory.
MrsDtoBe09
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
I see on FB that lots of people I grew up with still hang out together. One of those people organized a little reunion for all the people we went to junior high with. I was so excited to go and catch up and then when I went, I was really disappointed! I remember doing crazy stuff with them when we were younger and it seems like a lot of them never grew up from that - still smoking pot every day, a lot of them didn't have 'real' jobs yet...it was almost sad. So that made me realize that there's a reason why some people (and memories) should just be a part of your past.
meara
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Re: Been thinking and wondering...
well there was quite a while when I lost touch with all my HS friends - they all lived in manhattan and I was living in another state not even remotely close by. . and in the last few years we have all rekindled our friendships .. so I do think that it's possible for it to happen but you def have to want it. . I think part of it was being close by to some of them when I moved back to NY. . but now we also all go away once a year too.
There are other folks though that I have lost touch with (probably forever) and I agree that it's kind of sad. . just highlights the passage of time in a depressing way. .
