I’ve written in the past about some of the interesting relational things about facebook. And now…another one.

I’m writing this on the day where I write about relationships with enemies, but that might or might not be extreme for the topic today.  You see, one thing that is fascinating about Facebook is the ability to be friends again with people you’ve been around in days gone by, in different eras of your life.  This is great in one sense, because I love seeing friends I haven’t seen in a while.  In another though, we must meet up with the realization that there is a reason we are no longer in that season of our life.

For instance, I grew up in the thriving metropolis of Fremont, Ohio.  A set of my friends live there or know me from there.  The theology was rigid and the music was bad.

At 17, I moved to Pensacola, Florida to attend college.  A big number of my friends attended there with me.  The theology was also rigid, but the music was good.  By good, I mean professional as opposed to a type that I liked.

When I moved to Florida, my parents moved to Arizona, so during the summers I lived there.  A small portion of my friends live or lived there.

After college, I moved to Atlanta, GA where I taught school and other odd jobs for the year of 1998.  It appears that I have a lot of facebook friends from this are of my life.

Then I moved to Massachusetts in the middle of 1998 and have been here ever since.  Meeting friends, seeing people move away.  Meeting new friends.

I bring all this up because I wonder whether it’s healthy to have an eye on all these people from all these various stages of life.  I’m really glad the technology exists, and I have become close again with friends from my past, and in some cases closer, but for the most part, it has been just a means of seeing that they ate chili this morning for breakfast or that their kid puked all over their back seat because of travel sickness.  But here’s the interesting predicament I’m processing.  I wonder if they (meaning my friends from a different era) like the ideal of the old Marty, who was sheltered and didn’t listen to rock music and didn’t say things like “crap” and “screwed”  and who towed the party lines when it came to eschatology and the church?

Then I wonder if I’m just creating a new crop of enemies for myself by having a facebook account?  I could just as easily write the names of the people who I’d really be in contact with, and get on with my life post facebook.  Wow!  That’s a lot to think about.

I’m just glad I didn’t grow up a Calvinist and jump out of those circles.  I would be so screwed.

I am friends with 3 of these people on Facebook. I have occasional facebook conversations with one of them.  But in 1984, these people were a major part of my life.

At some point I had to make an adjustment.  I had to be able to meet new people, say hi even when I didn’t feel like it, and open myself up to people even when it wasn’t comfortable.  With the meeting of new people came opening myself up to new ideas.  New ideas were not looked on positively by the community I was a part of in 1984, but they were important for my growth.

I think we grow fastest and best as people when we separate ourselves from our present communities for a time, and then come back to it for a time, like hopping back and forth through the middle of a river on rocks,  each side bringing a new and fresh perspective of the entirety of the river.

I grew up in Fremont, Ohio and have lived in Tucson, AZ; Pensacola, Fl; Atlanta, Ga; and Massachusetts. Each community bringing its own fresh perspectives and the ability to help me see things more clearly (and sometimes less clearly) as I continue on in life.

Sometimes I’m thrilled to have lived in all of these places and known all of these people and gathered all these perspectives, and sometimes I just want to be the little boy again.

I had way more hair back then.

I returned last night from my weekend trip to Ohio.  I have several great stories for you that I’ll share next Monday for “Monday’s Moments”, but for today, I’ll just give a story from my wife Carie and what she thought of our first trip together back to my hometown.

It has been 15 years since I graduated from high school and left Fremont, Ohio.  The town has not grown any and seems to be slowly headed for extinction by way of run down buildings and businesses that hardly seem used anymore, save for the liquor stores and tattoo parlors.

To be honest, Carie found the whole experience in Fremont to be creepy.  This coming from someone who grew up in some of the smaller towns of Massachusetts, that’s saying something.  It also didn’t help that it was a dark day due to a storm system across most of the midwest.  I really don’t think it was as bad as she did, but she’s my wife, so I certainly will respect her opinion.

What also didn’t help was that everyone who we talked to made her feel like a martyr for being a Christian and living in Massachusetts because “It must be so hard to be a Christian and live there,” or “How do you live in that blue state?” to which we constantly were saying, “Actually, we like it” or “We just take it one day at a time.” (yes, I occasionally use sarcasm)

Carie also wasn’t thrilled that everyone she talked to said “God bless you” as if it were a pat on the back or a handshake. I told her it was just a common greeting in the midwest, and this didn’t make her feel any better.  “Why would they want God to bless someone they don’t even know?” she asked. Good question. 

All in all, I enjoyed my time in Fremont, though there were moments of awkwardness and moments of resorting back to a religion (please don’t take this to mean something it doesn’t, like that I hate God or something) I have no desire to return to. But going back into memory lane can be a lot of fun, and on this day, it was….about 50% of the time.

Going back any time soon?

Until next time…