Recently I ran into an old high school friend. I hadn't seen her in 27 years. Being the scoundrel that I am, I just walked up to her in an arts and crafts fair we were both at and told her where she had studied. Of course her first reaction was "Who are you, and are you following me?". Follwed closely by a "Are you a Fed?" She belongs to the Puertorrican Nationalist movement, hence her apprehension.
Needless to say she was shocked that I had managed to recognize her after so many years. Especially since she wasn't in my class but two years ahead of me (she was 4th year I was 2nd). When I did some name dropping of some of her fellow classmates, she finally relaxed a bit (the fact that I was wearing dark shades, black pants & t-shirt, plus I'm pretty stocky wasn't helping much. Let's face it, I am a bit intimidating).
We spent the remainder of the week comparing notes and sharing anecdotes. I kept freaking her out with little details of her past that she thought NO ONE would have remembered, let alone me. Her husband was enjoying every minute of it.
Which brings to the fore my main problem: I have an exceptionally good memory. My wife can't remember everybody that went to school with us. She barely remembers our own classmates never mind other schoolmates. But me, I can recognize EVERYBODY despite the weight gain/loss, wrinkles, hair colorings (natural and otherwise), etc.
Another case. Today, on a whim fueled by a dream, I decided to track down an old California buddy of mine. Haven't sen him in over 17 years, 10 years sooner than my classmate, but still a long time ago.
So I sat down on my PC, did a search on his name and came across some 2000 hits. Not good. Narrowed down the search to a certain word he used to use and came up with some 1500 hits. Came across an interesting site that had some familiar details about his life and what not. Did some judicious "hacking" and finally found a photo of my old compadre. I found out that he had an account on Ebay and tracked him down there. Sent him an email.
The reaction was the same I get whenever I recognize an old friend somewhere: "How the hell did you find me?!!!". As if I was some kind of US Marshall tracking down David Jansen in the Fugitive (Harrison Ford in the newer version for you Yuppies).
I don't know, I get a kick out of finding old friends like this. Hell I tracked down my oldest friend all the way down in Mexico. Nearly gave him a coronary when I did. I mean for Pete's sake, I've known him since I was 12 years old and we hadn't seen each other since '86. But I tracked him down. Convinced him to come back to PR with his new wife and daughter. We still keep in touch. I even tracked down some of graduating class. We have an email group that keeps growing the more people I track down. Whenever someone comes to PR, I organize a little reunion with those of us still on the island. We all have great times then.
So basically what I'm saying is, remember your old friends. Keep track of them if you can. If not, try using Google. The surprise you give them will keep you both chuckling for a looong time. But most importantly, it's good to know that friendship, especially the good ones, doesn't fade with time. Just so long as you remember who your friends are.
