"If Susie was a Candy Bar"... Tales from Facebook, and Beyond

Do you” Twitter?” Are you” Linked- In”? Does a Facebook sound like a group of mug shots… folks you’d rather not be associated with? Does “My Space” describe your favorite comfortable chair across from the wide- screen television? You know the place where you put your feet up and relax after a long, hard day… If you have been asleep in that chair the last few years, you may not be familiar with social networking sites and what they can do for you!

Social networking sites (SNS) have revolutionized the way we communicate with each other. With a minimum investment of time, adults can connect with their friends, acquaintances and relatives, even their enemies and the occasional pervert! Specialized search engines allow you to locate people through schools they attended, e-mail addresses, or just by name. Privacy is always controlled by the user. Connections are made through online postings about anything from important events to insignificant ramblings…

Facebook is my networking site of choice. Facebook (FB) was designed for college students but is now used predominantly used by the 35-54 year old group… my demographic! It is very easy to use… go to www.facebook.com, and walk through the instructions for set up.

My husband does not understand my affinity for FB… He says, “ I don’t want Little Johnnie to know my biz-ness…”… or “What do I care if Susie was a candy bar, she’d be an Almond Joy! “ I understand his desire to keep his private life separate from his professional life as an educator.

Case in point, did you hear in the news a few months ago, about John Sawyers, the incoming head of Britain’s international spy agency? This man is the equivalent of 007! Mr. Sawyers had his identity compromised when his wife posted information about him on her Facebook account. In addition to giving information about his family and residence, he was photographed in a SPEEDO , for goodness sakes, frolicking on the beach… Mr. Sawyers’, (aka 007) , secret was almost exposed, and it wasn’t his name, rank or serial number!

Horror stories aside, Facebook has allowed me to reconnect with friends from all over the world, all of whom, according to their profile photos, are more appropriately dressed than Mr. John Sawyers! Recently, I was reunited with two friends, whom I had not seen or spoken to in almost 15 years…

The first face that I was reunited with is my friend, Alcira. After attending college together, we continued our friendship during our first professional jobs at a small design firm in Greensboro. Alcira eventually married, moved back to her native home of El Salvador. Somewhere along the way, my computer crashed with her e-mail address, we changed service providers for our e-mail accounts, and I eventually failed to get her mailing address and phone number transferred into new address books as they were updated. She was literally “lost.”

Interestingly enough, technology had intervened on our behalf many years prior to help us stay in touch… back in the 80’s , while she was home in El Salvador , my husband and I were watching CNN, only to see that some terrorists had taken over a hotel in her hometown. One phone call later and my pitiful attempts at Spanish, “Al-ceera Sah-ca, pour four VORE”, (she had written out phonetically before she left)… And we both quickly discovered that news travels much faster here in the US. Unbeknownst to her family, civil war was just breaking out in El Salvador and she had to be smuggled out of the country. Her life and her family’s lives were in danger. Our connection, albeit before the age of the internet, may have saved her life!

Fast forward to a few short weeks ago… Imagine my delight at finding a “friend request’ from her on Facebook, and learning that she was planning a visit here to North Carolina in a few short weeks. Imagine also my delight earlier this week, as the virtual world melted into the real world, when I was finally able to hug her, talk to her, see her smile in person, and to meet her new family!

Facebook was also the impetus that allowed me to reunite with my friend, Jan Foster Mack. Jan was an acquaintance in high school that became a good friend in my early years of college. … I last saw her at a class reunion in 1995. While many of my former high school classmates have reconnected online, she, like many others, was “lost” to me. I was eventually contacted by her brother via Facebook. Through him, I found out that Jan was really sick, living in Maryland, dying really, with a rare simultaneous disease of Leukemia and pancreatic cancer. In addition to her illness, I learned that she and her family had faced some huge challenges during the last years. I wish I had known…

Jan passed away last week, and ironically, I attended her funeral just one day after my reunion with Alcira. I was grateful to learn of her illness in time to send her a card a few weeks before she passed… an opportunity that would have been missed entirely had her brother, Rex, not found me online. While attending her memorial service, her friends and family spoke about the details of her life. It was comforting to know that the tremendous spirit contained in such a little person, never really waivered, never really changed, despite insurmountable odds. It was with regret however, that I found myself thinking, “Oh, I didn’t KNOW she loved to travel… I didn’t KNOW she was so interested in the arts… We would have had SO MUCH in common.” It was this realization that made me wish we had maintained our friendship over the years”.

There are more faces out there…Can you see them? Could it be someone in your life? Is there someone out there you need to reconnect with? Is there someone you have “lost”?

My great friends, (and you know who you are out there), my sisters… you are THE REAL DEAL! Your friendships are among the greatest treasures of my life. Facebook is no substitute for these kinds of relationships … the one-on-one friendships that require much more of us than a witty response or a sassy photo, the sustaining relationships that nourish our spirits. Most communication on Facebook is casual, even mundane, friends joking around, that kind of thing… but my point is, you never really know when it could matter… sometimes you don’t know what you don’t know….and that could have a PROFOUND effect on a life… a REAL life, not a virtual one.

Reconnecting with old friends, making new friends, a word of appreciation, making someone laugh, just letting people know they are not alone…that is what life is all about. Facebook , along with the other social networking sites , is just one of the many ways to help make that happen, to open the door of POSSIBILITY.