Lately
29/03/2006
Had dinner with my friends from college today
And we were talking about old times – and how from each stage of our education, we kept in touch with a handful of friends.
I haven’t been too good with friends – I hardly see my primary school friend. I have not kept in contact with any of my secondary school friends. I only did reasonably well with my JC and college friends.
I’m one of the reasons why Friendster, Classmates.com, Facebook.com aren’t going to be superhits.
On a sidenote: Facebook should’ve sold out for $750million while they had a chance. They’re not worth $2billion. Not by a longshot. They’re not even worth $750m in my book.
The only reason why my friendlist on IM is populated is because I use it for work. It goes for my 360 profile – they’re mostly my work friends there.
Someone I knew some years back said history and geography don’t make a friendship. And he was absolutely right. I think that’s why I made friends at a faster rate outside of school – with my work/previous work friends, I found common interests. You don’t really have to interact for prolonged periods with people when you don’t want to, mostly because there is little social pressure to. Also you tend to realise that it’s just a job, and you can turn it off at the end of the day. So the people you hang out with, are the people you have fun with.
The people I met in school – though numerous – often fail the test of time. And when you distill it you’re left with the ones you enjoy your time with. Because you have things in common, or because you have similar views or priorities.
The problem is most times, people don’t re-evaluate their relationships. They rely on history. We forget that relationships evolve along with people and not everyone’s path is linear. Sometimes people grow apart. Which kind of explains why we end up asking ourselves what posessed us to spend our time with some people for years. The answer most of the time is it probably didn’t start out that way.
The way I see it, there are only so many things I can and want to focus my life on. And what I doesn’t simplify, I let go of. Sometimes it’s hard, sometimes it’s easier than we think it is. All you need to do, is make up your mind and do it.
Shedding baggage is the best thing you can do for yourself. And then, you’ll have time and energy for the people you really care about.
Anyway, Happy Belated Bday Mrs Chang, who doesn’t read my blog. See you and Sue in half a year.
