Old friends are New friends

I LOVE my friends!

I'm embarrassed to say that my mom was on Face Book before I was. It took most of my immediate family to convince me to check it out about 2 years ago... now I have about 675 friends! And I love them... I've had people ask how I could know that many people and how I could keep up with that many people.

The second question is easy to answer: I don't... I wish I did, but my "friends" fluctuate randomly. I lose a friend and I have no idea who dumped me. When I notice I've lost someone, I get bummed. Even when I can't figure out who dropped out, it still makes me sad, because I really do love my FB friends.

My FB friends helped me out of a rough time in my life, when the WEB was my only social outlet. Most are old friends, but a few I have never even met. I happened to get on FB just before my 20th high school reunions, so that let me be involved in both reunions. I was especially excited to find my old Roosevelt buddies (sorry Springfield friends, I love you, too!) I moved abruptly in the middle of high school, during the summer between Sophomore and Junior years, and I hadn't had a chance to even say good bye to most of them. Now I get invites to go and do stuff with friends I haven't seen in 25 years. What a blast!

That leads back to the first question: how do I know so many people? Besides family, I think my oldest friends out here are from when my dad was in the Air force, around the time I was born. Our families kept in touch and used to visit each other on vacations. Then we lived in Redmond for a while (not sure if I still have anyone from there.) Then came Roseburg, where I went to Kindergarten and most of grade school. Also during this time, my parents worked with the church youth group for 7(ish) years, cycling through 2 full youth groups (in Roseburg, High School was only 10th, 11th, and 12th grades.) I recently added a bunch of the old Roseburg gang to my friends list while hunting down people to invite to my dad's retirement party. It's fun to reconnect with a group of people who had a huge impact on my life!

In 5th grade I attended three different schools, as my parents got settled in Portland. I know I have FB friends from all three schools, which is pretty cool. (let me just add here that I checked my FB just now and had a friend request from someone I knew in grade school!) Then I moved to George for middle school (before it was only a middle school.) Two years at Roosevelt High and two at Springfield. Plus a degree from George Fox, earned over a period of five years, and a semester at Lame Community College, add in 5 summer missions trips, jobs, and three more youth groups with my parents' churches after I had moved... I'm sure I'm leaving out a chunk of people.... oh yeah, all my ex-boyfriends! Just kidding... there aren't that many of them out here!

I have always had my close friends (you know who you are,) but was never exclusive to a clique or certain group. That can also explain the number of friends. When I was young, I remember my dad telling people that anyone I met became my friend... I think he was right. You have to go out of your way to make me not like you. And even then, it only takes a small gesture to be friends again.

So now we have this new way of staying in touch. It seems as though my old friends are really becoming my new friends, now as adults (well, some of you are adults.) I enjoy seeing the people you have become. You bring my past into my present, and I love you for it!

I love to hear from my friends, so feel free to comment or become a follower out here!
-jaymi-

ps... my buddy aaron is getting sicker, and as we prepare to say good bye to this amazing person, I want to remind you put feet to your words and donate what you can, to help him and his wife (who was recently laid off) make earthly ends meet as he meets with his end on this earth. His blog is linked at the bottom of this one... just click and read his story and press the "donate" button.