Have you ever heard from someone that really believed you would never hear from again?

Let it rest and absorb it for now.

Yes and funny you should ask. Today I recieved a message from a young lady that I thought was gone for good. I haven’t heard from her in years and now I am married and not looking for anything new. She just send me some pictures and wants to know how things are. I have mixed feelings about it but have not responded to her. She used to mean a lot to me and I’m not going to start anything up again it wouldn’t be fair to my SO.

Thanks to Facebook…

I’m still waiting to here from my Dad…......well I say waiting. What I really mean is, ain’t going to happen. Which is fine, I mean it’s only been fumpfty basquillion years :¬)

Forty two years later, “are you xxxxxx?” We are both married and remarried. We went out off and on for two years way back then.
Thanks to FB.
Contact was good, a lot of things have changed but it is nice to hear from someone years and years ago.

@TheOnlyNeffie : Wow. Just…Wow.

Yeah, an old BF on classmates emailed me and my ex a year after we broke up. He called again, I was shocked. We married six months later.

Not someone that I thought were dead or missing. I have thought I would never see some people again but those are stories that make me sad.

Well, not to that extent. But today I was contacted by a former friend who cut me out of her life and I haven’t spoken to in months. She is in the process of moving to another country and I was convinced she would never speak to me again. Must be the day for this sort of thing.

@TheOnlyNeffie This is very intense. Did the person give any indication whether they wanted to talk or reforge the friendship? Are you feeling the loss all over again since they are no longer the same person?

@tragiclikebowie you hit the nail on the head, I think. I thought this was over. There was a long period where I really believed this person was dead, not just vegetative. Now they are not only alive, but apparently at least some part of the brain has healed. The only way I am able to speak to them is through the mother that once cut off contact with me. To be completely honest, I’m not even certain that the person actually remembers me. I have no idea what their memory is like at this point. Considering the dramatic changes from the person that they were before the accident, I’m a little bit skeptical that they even know who I am. I’m in a little bit of a whirlwind, I have to admit. It is a little bit like a glaring reminder that the person I loved will never really be coming back, I think you tapped into the real issue when you said that it is like feeling the loss all over again. Sorry, that was long and probably a little bit more info than you wanted.

A few, a few.

The magician seemed to promise that something torn to bits might be mended without a seam, that what had vanished might reappear, that a scattered handful of doves or dust might be reunited by a word, that a paper rose consumed by fire could be made to bloom from a pile of ash. But everyone knew that it was only an illusion. The true magic of this broken world lay in the ability of the things it contained to vanish, to become so thoroughly lost, that they might never have existed in the first place.—Michael Chabon

@BarnacleBill beautiful. And true.

I think you will have a second round of mourning for your friend. He was lost the first time, but even though he survived and recovered, the person is gone, taken by the accident. Actually, the accident probably took two people, for in the aftermath of the tragedy of the accident, a lot of his mother was probably lost for good as well, in becoming a caregiver for a comatose child.

I was very close to a neighbor’s son, driving him to school every morning for several years, as his school was on the way to my daughter’s schools. Between the ages of 17 and 20, he was in 3 car accidents, each more serious than the previous one. The last one ended up killing his girlfriend and her 12 year old sister. They were on the way back from an amusement park, and he ran off the road, over an embankment. It took him months to walk again. The whole experience left him with the pieces not truly connected, a fragile shell of himself.

@BarnacleBill “She”, actually. And I believe you’re right. The story about your neighbor’s son is so tragic, what a terribly sad thing. Broke my heart just to read it, I can’t even imagine.

After a long period of time? Yes, I have… but the story your opening question reminded me of is not like that. I hope you are okay now!

Now I feel like it would be mean for me to share the story your question made me think of… :(

@AnonymousGirl don’t feel bad sharing your story. I like happy stories just as much as the next person.
I forgot that I even asked this question.

Alright. Well, thanks for the permission.

Here’s my story:

Sort of. My family used to be really good friends with this other family when i was a small child. I have a lot of memories with them, but I had the closest connection with the girl in that family who was very close to me in age. My family ended up leaving the church we attended and I didn’t hear from her in a long time. We might have seen each other at an event once, but I’m not sure.

While I heard from them here and there (like when my Dad would get e-mails from the Dad of that family, or when some of my family members saw them in the hospital because of something that happened to one of their sons heads while my Mom was in the hospital for other reasons), nothing I heard about them had to do with me or the one I viewed as a close childhood friend of mine.

One of my close friends from High School ended up introducing me to a boyfriend of hers she met at college because she wanted me to meet him. When I first met this guy, I would never guess that he would be my connection without him knowing to my friend I missed so much.

One day, his mother, of all people, sent me a message on Facebook because she was absolutely thrilled that we had mutual friends that she both knew and loved very much. We chatted back and forth and shared how we knew them. It turned out that she had attended this church my family had intended when her son (my friend’s boyfriend) was a baby, which was before my parents decided to go there. I asked about the other family, seeing as our mutual Facebook friends who inspired her to contact me were my childhood friend’s Aunt and Uncle.

Oh, boy, was she happy to know I also knew them. In fact, she’d just seen that family very recently. Maybe even that very day. I asked about my friend and made it clear why I wanted to know and that I missed her.

Not soon after our conversation, she saw that family again and decided to message me again. She told me she’d talked to my friend and that my friend had the biggest smile on her face when she brought me up because she was so happy to hear about me. The message totally made my day.

I wish that family would get on Facebook and I wish their parents weren’t as strict as they are. It would be easier to keep in touch.

At the same time, though, I don’t know if we have enough in common anymore. I no longer consider myself Christian… and I hope she wouldn’t view that as a fault, considering her parents seemed to be the type of parents who only want their children associating with other Christians.