Recently, a childhood friend reached out to me through LinkedIn. I grew up with him and his twin brother. We were close and spent a lot of time with each other like we were actual brothers. In our twenties, we lost touch. I knew generally where they were (which state…) but I couldn’t find them. Eventually, I gave up looking.
I lost touch with all of my childhood friends. Losing contact with the twins was the biggest loss. In my adult life I have known people who have maintained a strong connection to early friends. I felt envious of their connections. I was bummed that I was missing out. Of course, because of my own baggage, I assumed that losing connection with the twins was my fault. I carried this cloud with me.
Generally, I struggle with isolation. My father drank too much and retreated from the world. His decline was hard to witness, but I found myself following his path. At one point in my life, I had lost connection with all of my friends. By a stroke of grace, I had my spouse, children, and extended family in my life, so I wasn’t completely alone.
After Covid, I’ve been open to reconnecting with old friends. It started with college friends. Because of my baggage, I figured many of them didn’t care one way or the other what happened to me. When I went to a college reunion, I was blown away from their reaction. So many were passionately happy to reconnect. I was missed.
After a long hiatus, I meet with a good friend once a month for coffee. We cover every topic under the sun and never run out of things to talk about.
So, when the twins reached out to me, it was the continuation of my journey to revitalize my friendships. We met for breakfast with our wives, and shared stories, from the old days, and about the families we all created. I was impressed that one twin brought a picture album and was proud to include pictures of me in his collection of cherished memories. Again, my baggage (a euphemism for my low self-esteem) told me that we lost touch because I was a nobody and they didn’t care. I found out I was wrong. The morning flew by, and we made promises to gather again.
I’ve been wanting to write about this reconnection because it was very healing for me. It’s a good event and it lifts me up. I need it today, because I just got a bad Kirkus review of my latest book. I was hoping for a good review to bolster my marketing. No going. I guess one can’t please everybody, but the reviewer went out of their way to be negative. The worst part is the money I spent for the review. Of course, I have friends and family who love my new book. In fact, one of the twins brought his copy and asked me to sign it. He couldn’t say enough good things about it. I’ll hang my hat on that!
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