Reconnecting

Today's been an off day for me. Woke up this morning with bad allergy issues (the sniffling and other symptoms were pretty positive clues), so I called in sick to work, took my meds, and stayed home. Fortunately, the internet connection is back up; the local cable ISP has been doing something that's been causing connection drops since last Thursday. When you're used to always-on, suddenly off gets a bit frustrating.

The theme to this week so far seems to be "reconnecting". On Monday, I jumped onto Yahoo for chat, something I haven't done in ages because I'd resolved to spend less time online and more time getting out and seeking connections in real life rather than virtually (then back in the days when I was working two jobs and going to grad school and couldn't meet many people outside those arenas). In the last three days back online, I've encountered a friend from the West Coast who I lost track of for awhile after she got married and moved out to D.C. I'd heard from her once between then and now, and this time, I discovered that she had gotten divorced and is now in Tucson, pending a move next year back to San Diego. Then today, I had a nice chat convo and reconnected with a long-time friend from Oklahoma, who I met online when I used to live in Kansas. Funnily enough, we never actually "met" in real life until she had moved to Chicago and I had come to Iowa, but she was someone who was there for me and made the lonliness bearable during the first year following my breakup with the ex, and I realized today that I have never thanked her for being there for me.

Encountering both was a very pleasant surprise, and also a reminder that life has moved on for all of us. And a reminder that I'm still searching for (and yearning for) a sense of close connection here in Iowa. Yes, I've made some close friends across the country ... some from high school, quite a few elsewhere (some in MO, some in CO, some in MI ... all with some common interests and bound by the tenuous virtual filament of phone line and fiber-optic cables). I have also made a few close friends here as well, but seems like quite a few of my "friends" here are, in their own way, friends who come and go because they, like me, are also looking for a serious relationship, and when they get involved with someone, their other friendships get neglected. Why this is, I don't know, but I wish some people would be more considerate. After all, who is going to be there to cry with you when the relationship goes sour, or rejoice with you when the wedding invitations get sent out? Just a thought ....