Aware of my particular interest, people who are better read than I (and you know who you are, Dan) have lately mentioned blogs, opinion pieces, news articles, and other online musings about the state of the U.S. Postal Service. Andrew Sullivan's The Dish gave readers a forum to weigh in on the USPS Crisis at least five times last year.
In one of those, a reader mentioned Senator Claire McCaskill's suggestion that "there is a longing out there right now, especially in these uncertain times, for some of the things that have provided stability over the years." Joe Lieberman chimed in, "We should be writing more passionate letters to those we love."
Sullivan's astute reader then offered this priceless opinion:
Does McCaskill live in 2011, or 1950? The personal letter is DEAD. Everyone calls, texts or emails the ones they love, or they Skype. It’s like saying that cars and gasoline are too expensive, so let’s start a campaign to get more people to ride horses.
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| The New Yorker gets it. |
Meanwhile, another friend (okay, it, too, was Dan) posted this link to an article in the Times: Friends of a Certain Age. In case you're disinclined, as I am, to read too much in one day, I'll summarize: the older we get, the harder it is to make friends. (It's a good article by Alex Williams. You should read it yourself. There are loads of funny examples, like the woman with 857 Facebook friends and 509 Twitter followers who couldn't get enough people together to celebrate her 39th birthday.)
The article also reminded me of that experience - you know the one - where you're hanging out with someone cool, finishing each other's sentences, laughing your heads off, and then everything comes to a screeching halt when one of you says, "Let's do this again sometime." Blackberries are consulted - on rare occasions, among my fellow Luddites, notebooks are whipped out - dates are tossed, and sometime between dessert and calculating the tip, a mutually agreeable date is discovered.
And it's sometime in February 2014.
Having read the two pieces back to back - Andrew Sullivan's reader opinion and Alex William's article - they merged in my brain to form one disturbing question: Is friendship, like the personal letter, DEAD?
Nay, I say, nay. Or perhaps, only if you let it be. The evidence is in, the jury is out, the verdict is clear, I've been saying it all along: we can't sustain friendships - not the meaningful ones, anyway - exclusively through email and social media.
If we live too far apart, or our schedules are just so hectic that we no longer feel like B.F.F.'s but K.O.F.'s ("Kind of Friends"), then what other choice do we have?
Don't Skype your friend. Write him an old-fashioned letter. Maybe invite her to save gas with you and go for a horseback ride.
Even if it's just for old times' sake.
2 comments:
As someome like yourself who has moved around more times then my mom has pages in her address book, friendship is harder the older you get. An exclaimation point was put on point when I left Denver. As I was leaving I was sad. But outside of family that lived in Colorado, I only had one person that I felt like I could call on my way out of town. And, we met when we lived in TX! Don't get me wrong, I met and had MANY aquaintances. Wonderful people I shared great times and events with. However, I hadn't lived there long enough to have deeper relationships. It takes time and events to link our lives to others. I have a wonderful quilt full of great patches but the friend thing I have to admit has been hard. Even for someone like me who will talk to a door knob! :)
As someome like yourself who has moved around more times then my mom has pages in her address book, friendship is harder the older you get. An exclaimation point was put on point when I left Denver. As I was leaving I was sad. But outside of family that lived in Colorado, I only had one person that I felt like I could call on my way out of town. And, we met when we lived in TX! Don't get me wrong, I met and had MANY aquaintances. Wonderful people I shared great times and events with. However, I hadn't lived there long enough to have deeper relationships. It takes time and events to link our lives to others. I have a wonderful quilt full of great patches but the friend thing I have to admit has been hard. Even for someone like me who will talk to a door knob! :)
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