The Friendship Tree

“Remember, friends last a lifetime!” This is something my teachers and my parents always told me when I was moving to a new town and school. I believed this to be true, until the day came when I could not remember their face, their voice, or even their hair color. It seems that there are some friends that are difficult to keep when you do not see them on a regular basis.

I envision the friends I make in lifetime as the branches on a tree. I start at the bottom of the trunk, when I make a friend, but at some point we both go off to a different branch. On this new branch, you form different friendships, and again, at some point, separate to another branch. The branches holding all of my friends grow further apart and are moved away by the nature of life. Once in a while my friends and I trek back to the trunk and meet up again, but our individual lives direct us towards our own branches. I go left, and my friend goes right.

During elementary school I was extremely close to a good friend. He and I got along easily, could go to the movies, play games, and spend the night at each others house. I moved to South Carolina and we tried to continue our friendship by e-mails and phone calls. After less than half a year, the e-mails became sparse and our friendship subsided. I had hoped the use of the internet and the social networking tools would be enough to keep us bonded. Those methods worked for a little while, but if I saw him today, I am not sure that I would recognize him or even have anything to say to him. I would want to tell him, “Hey, It’s me! Remember, from third grade?” I would hope that his memory would spark and all the good times we had would come back.

Just recently, near the beginning of this school year, I went to a local store to find a backpack. While surveying the vast majority of styles of backpacks, I noticed someone that I went to middle school with. Since that time we both had gone off to different high schools. The two of us made eye contact but did not say a word to each other. My assumption is that the lack of continued personal interaction between the two of us weakened our friendship.

I have made many friends in my fourteen years, I have also moved several times in those years. Every time that I moved, I left behind good friends and hope to keep in touch. I move on to make new friends and do my best to keep the connection to my old friends. Friends that I moved away from tended to grow farther apart from me and became not friends, but acquaintances. So, do friends last a lifetime? Do they remember me after years of separation? What happens when I bump into one of them? Will I remember them? Will they remember me? How will the two of us react? And will we be able to reconnect?