A recent survey found that social networks have passed up email as the primary method of online communication. I used to have a free account with places like Alumni.com (later Reunion.com...now MyLife.com) & Classmates.com. But most all wanted me to pay for the ability to interact more with my former schoolmates. Enter Facebook. In a single year, my friends list mushroomed by 100+ as old friends (and I do not use this term loosely) reconnected....and it didn't cost me a dime. So pardon my distraction.
At the same time I was getting some of these friend requests, my mind was faced with a quandary. Why on earth did some of these folks decide to suddenly inquire about me? I never seemed to strike up much of an interest with them when I was in high school. Oh, sure. I know there is so much drama in the juvenile world. There is now, there was then. But nevertheless my experience in my high school life wasn't all that stellar. It was pretty blah.
Familiarity breeds contempt & by the time I had lived through a dozen years in my local public school system, there was plenty of contempt to go around. I was not athletic (although you could say I was a great "athletic supporter") so I didn't fit in with the "jocks". I wasn't talented enough to play an instrument, so I wasn't in the band. I didn't get straight A's (or many B's either, actually) so I wasn't in with the school's Brain Trust. So, that pretty much left me in the invisible crowd...not really paid much of mind to.
Add that to the frequent "butt of jokes", & what you have is a total disinterest in my high school life. A lot of this started with my 7th Grade exposure to the school body. At a pep rally...where all students (7th-12th Grades) were assembled in the local armory. There, a "marshmallow eating contest" (or so they called it) to see who could consume the most amount of jumbo marshmallows that would be stuffed into one's mouth by the school cheerleaders (i.e. the snooty girls).
Well, what do you know? Little ol' me was picked as one of the contestants to join the other half-dozen slouches to sit cross-legged on the floor in front of some 670 students. We were blindfolded by our cheerleader then at the signal, I felt handfuls of marshmallows mashed into my face & I began trying to swallow as many as I could--all in the name of "school spirit". The crowd was roaring with cheers, jeers, & laughs.... When it was over, & a "winner" was declared, we all had our blindfolds removed & were allowed to return to the bleachers.
I was met (along with the others who were called down) by kids laughing themselves silly, pointing at me & saying I needed to get to the bathroom to wash my face. Somewhat confused, I made my way to the boys' room where, lo & behold, there I stood...my face blackened by powered charcoal...which had covered those jumbo marshmallows. I looked like I had licked the fireplace completely clean.
All in the name of "school spirit".
As I said...such was par for the course.
After graduation, I departed for college--about 4 1/2 hours from my hometown. It was there my social experience "matured" significantly. And it was over those next 4 years I actually established friendships that would go on to last to this day...friendships that overshadowed those from the high school daze.
So, this is why it struck me as odd that now--some 30 years later on Facebook--that I'm suddenly getting requests from folks who went to high school with me. What do I have in common with them? With the huge gap in time between then & now, what has changed to the point that now I'm a person of interest? In some regards, those same old feelings started to rise to the surface that I had while back in high school. And in some way, I was faced with feelings of "why bother"? There wasn't much there in regards to having any connection in high school....and so there was little to start anything further. I felt like a tortise who was wasn't sure it was worth coming out of his shell.
So I decided, "what the heck?" Let's see what happens. It's a new century. Maybe since "familiarity breeds contempt", then, "absence makes the heart grow fonder."
