I joined LinkedIn a couple of years ago, and plainly confess to not having the time or maybe inclination to work it to my professional advantage. But it did turn up some people from college I was delighted to hear from again, in one case after a hiatus of 30 years.

 

But with Facebook, I am hearing from high school friends. Just last evening I friended, or was friended by, not sure which, by someone who was a girl when we last spoke. The friending leads to viewing the profile photos. Nothing strange there – her husband, kids, dogs. But, like, who was I to be looking at this photo album, the shards of a life of someone I hadn’t spoken with or even thought about in more than a third of a century?

 

On the other hand, why not? I have mostly pleasant memories of high school. In some ways, being in touch with one’s past in Facebook makes life a little more 19^th century, when people tended to be born and grow up within a small physical radius and so were likely to have the same circle of acquaintances for a lifetime. Now we tend to have successive lives we leave behind like old cars.

 

My goal for my Facebook account was professional networking, and that is happening. Lots of people in the greater community of federal IT and communications are already in the Facebook swim. But I am finding a slightly weird fascination with these ancient relationships, the renewal of which somehow collapse the telescope of life. And give me a new look at myself.