Correspondence

Lately I’ve been thinking about what it means to stay in touch. I’m behind on all my communication, a friend texted me; and I wrote back, several days later, to say So am I. I’ve joined, recently, a couple of fitness-related online forums; this morning I texted several friends I’ve been meaning to write back to for several days; I called my mom, and spoke to my uncle. I made plans to have dinner with a couple of pre-pandemic colleagues who I have seen only once, briefly, since then. 

I don’t really know what to do about the people who are farther away – the friends who, in earlier days, I expected to see a couple of times a year in the course of one or another business trips, but who I now haven’t seen more than once since 2020. How does anyone stay up to date on someone else’s life? And is staying up to date even the point? Haven’t we all changed so much in recent years that up to date is nearly meaningless – or do we always change so much, and only in this decade notice?