A Long-Lost Friend is Found

Have you ever found a long-lost friend?  I mean, truly lost touch with someone dear to you and then found them again after many years?  This happened to me.  Eight years ago, I lost contact with a dear friend, "C," due to phone problems and cross-country moves.  I tried to find her several times.  Back then, I don't think she really did much with email.  Not sure if she even had an email address, so I couldn't just send her a quick message with my new number and address.  I tried good old-fashioned snail mail, and that didn't work either.  When Facebook came out, I searched for her with no luck.  I even searched the friend lists of people I  thought she would surely be friends with if she were on FB.  Nothing.

Yesterday was another friend, "S's" birthday.  I popped over to S's FB "wall" to wish her a happy day, and whose name did I see there also sending her birthday wishes?  Yes, my long-lost friend, C.  I just about fell out of my chair in my haste to send her a friend request.  Then I waited nervously to see whether she would accept my request and "friend" me.  See, I'm not a huge FB user.  I don't choose to be "FB Friends" with everyone I ever knew.  I don't necessarily want to be found easily on FB, so I don't put my maiden name in my profile, nor do I use a photo of myself as my profile pic.  And due to one of the many and seemingly arbitrary changes that FB has made recently, you can no longer send a little message when you request to be someone's friend.  So, I was nervous that C wouldn't know who I was and wouldn't friend me.

I needn't have feared.  The next time I checked my FB page I saw a happy and heartfelt message from C that just about made me cry tears of joy.  Evidently, she has missed me too.

The last time I spoke to C, I was finishing my internship at the end of my doctoral training program.  I wasn't married.  I didn't have kids.  She was already married and had four little ones. Now her kids are so big.  One just graduated from high school!  So much has changed for both of us.  I can't wait to hear more from her and get caught up on everything that has happened in the last eight years.  My heart is so happy because I have found my dear friend again.

Although I don't use it a ton, right now I am thanking Facebook with all my might.