Friendships in the Computer Age

I used to email and chat quite a bit in the past. Lots of things have changed in the past few months. I went from five email accounts down to two. One for business and one for personal. I don't have all of the instant messaging stuff running all the time now. In fact, I chat very little nowadays. Self-preservation has made me make these changes. I don't email or chat with the intensity I did this time last year.

My new job has me sleeping all sorts of strange hours. This is the main reason I had to make those changes. I woke up tonight after midnight. I did my usual ritual of checking my email and my Facebook account. I actually got to speak to a friend that I had meant to speak to ages ago but never had the opportunity. Had a pleasant conversation with her and got to know her a bit better in the process. I was glad I did. My gain there. :)

After this talk, I got to thinking. There are a lot of my friends on Facebook that have added me who I do not even know. Somehow this made me pretty sad. There are people behind the names after all. They have hopes, dreams and needs that I will never ever know about unless I get to know them. Problem is I have over 1500 friends. Most of my friends added me for gaming purposes. Some of the games I have stopped playing because I don't have the time now that I am back at work. I lost touch with some of the friends I became close to. This made me sad too.
 
I guess that its kinda like when you have a tiny bit of mayonnaise in the bottom of the jar and a large slice of bread. You don't have enough to go around and you spread it too thin. I have spread myself too thin this past year. Again, this made me sad. Now I can't change any mistakes I have made in the past. I can, however, do something about my actions in the here and now and in the future. So this idea came to post a new status:

I was just thinking wouldn't it be cool if all my friends chose someone from their friends list. Send that person a message telling them you are thinking about them. Actually treat that friend...like a friend. :) Just a thought.

While I thought this is a status truly from my heart, it opens me up to criticism for my neglect. Be that as it may, I decided to post it anyway. It's really all about the people and friendships after all. I guess all this to say I want to be a better friend. I want the quality of my friendships to be better. Not just on Facebook...in life! I am not looking for romance because my wife is all I have eyes for. My heart is hers. I am not looking for a best friend. I have one of  those too. Yeah, you know who you are. :) I do want to be genuine from this day forward and be what I can be though. Less gaming and more interaction. Will I lose friends? Probably so. I will gain true friends?  Hopefully. In the end...isn't that what it's all about?