Some time ago, whilst walking down a side road towards London’s busy Oxford Street, I said to the girl I was with, “These groups of people we meet, work with, socialise with, become friends with, and maybe even fall in love with. Isn’t it funny how often they change over time.”
We had just been for a drink to celebrate our last day of work. We hadn’t worked immediately together, rather ‘in proximity with’ each other, as is the case in large department stores.
As we continued down the road I remarked on the absurdity of it all. We’d only known each other four months, maybe less. In that time we’d become good friends who continue to keep in touch over a year and a half later.
The same was of course true for countless other people we had both met during our time at the store. When you work within a group of people, these people become a big part of your life. In that moment in time it struck me how funny it is that such a big part of our life experience, the people we share it with, changes so often over time.
Turning the corner onto Oxford Street, looking up at the towering department store ahead of us, I looked over at the girl and said “Well, you know. Give it a few weeks and we’ll both have our own new groups of people”, new groups of people who, and here’s the funny thing, we hadn’t even met yet.
I’m sure if you were to take a couple of minutes to look through Facebook you could pinpoint the different groups that each person belongs to, be it school, college, university, or any job you’ve had over time.
No doubt when you think about each specific person you can remember back to your time in college, or your time working as a bartender during your second year of university.
Your group of people during any one moment underpin how you experience your life during that time. They are the backbone to these times.
You will have many more of these experiences in your lifetime, and you’ll amass many more groups of people to live through these experiences with you. These people you will meet, work with, socialise with, become friends with, and maybe even fall in love with.
And you know the funny thing? You haven’t even met them yet.
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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
I love this Ben! The idea that ‘you haven’t met them yet’ reminds me of a thought I sometimes have about future friendships or relationships and that is that those people already exist out in the world already doing their thing, as unaware as you, that one day you’ll know and potentially really care about or love each other. I really like that thought. Great post!
It’s an odd thought isn’t it. We’re not about to run out of people to meet anytime soon, we may even bump into some of them from time to time before we really get to know them.
I’m glad you could relate, thanks for commenting!
I think of Dylan’s lyrics: “all the people we used to know They’re an illusion to me now.” With FB we are given the “intimation” that friendships are unending, and need only some shared experience with cyberscript and mutual “liking”of popular culture.
No.
We are much deeper than that. We are nomads; our friendships are moments of unity in a world that is fractured. They are to be enjoyed and celebrated, but letting go authenticates their reality. Holding on just delays the true and loving goodbye.
Mark, you’ve reminded me of an experience a couple of years ago.
A couple of friends and I were queuing outside a small music venue in Oxford to see the band Foals (not that it’s relevant to the story, but they’re a great band nonetheless).
While waiting in line we struck up conversation with a Canadian couple who, unlike the majority of the line, hadn’t heard of the band and were purely queuing up for the hell of it, just for the experience.
Long story short, we had a great night with these guys, then when it came time to leave we DIDN’T exchange Facebook (or any other) details.
The reason? We all had a great night hanging out with these brand new people but we didn’t want our image of them to be altered (or even ruined) by six months worth of Farmville requests before we eventually blocked them.
It felt like we had met and left people the old-fashioned way. Letting go of these random strangers makes the experience seem MORE real in my mind, not less.
Thank you for the great input as always!
I love the way you dig into your moments. And think about the import. And YES: thee is more to friendships that allowed to pass into the ether: no need to cling and crave for threads of relationship that are best left alone.
I love this! You took me away to a wonderful place that I haven’t even been to yet, and I can’t wait to go ;)
Really glad it made you feel that way Christopher!