Staying in touch

I have friends from different stages, phases and places. I, however, am not a good friend to have. Not in the sense that I am a ‘bad’ friend; I’m not - I am very loyal and true. I’m just a bit vague about keeping in touch when I don’t see people every day, or at least every week.

It’s easy to blame geography. There are people I like dotted all over Britain, but the expense – and logistics – makes ‘popping’ down to London see a mate for the weekend pretty unrealistic. The older we get, the more complicated and responsible our lives become: frivolity and impulse start to wither.

In the age of mass communication, you wouldn’t think it would be so difficult. We have email, we have mobile phones. Just how hard can it be to make that call, tap in that text or type a couple of lines of “hello, how’s it going?” to people you consider yourself close to? But you leave it, and leave it, and suddenly it’s much more difficult to pick up the threads...

When I was moving house last year, tucked inside an old diary, I found a letter I had written to an Australian friend I used to work with. It was long, enthusiastic and full of gossip about places and people we used to know. I had never posted it. My friend was in the same industry as me and as her surname was spelled in an unusual way, it was easy to Google her and find her email address. I sent an email but didn’t get a reply; I can’t blame her – it was my first contact in more than a decade. When the teacher hands out the friendship report, mine will probably say: “Must try harder” …

Picture: Farewell My Love http://www.wallaceartworks.com/farewell_my_love.htm

Out of touch

I forgot to take my mobile phone to work today. I had a slight “Oh, bugger,” moment when I realised it wasn’t in my bag, but my heart didn’t start to beat faster and I didn’t need a brown paper bag to blow into. It crossed my mind that according to the dictates of Sod’s Law, someone would need to get in touch with me, but the odds were in favour of my surviving the day without it.

I am always in trouble with people for not carrying my mobile with me every single second of the day. At the weekend and evenings, it’s usually minding its own business on the bedside table. “Why didn’t you answer your phone?” ask mobile-addicted friends, who then berate me for my foolishness: “It might have been important.”

These are people who have the latest, blingy, all singing all-dancing mobile models. My brother even has one with a TV button on it. Mine, on the other hand, is five years old and doesn’t even have a camera. It is geriatric in mobile terms but it does a passable impression of the White Horses theme tune when it rings.

It’s not that long since the mobile phone was a novelty, not a necessity. I do not dispute that it has saved people’s lives when they have been stuck on the sides of snowy mountains or when shipwrecked in stormy seas. If I were planning to climb a mountain or sail the oceans, I’d probably take my phone with me. But in the general scheme of things, I don’t always want to be contacted 24-hours-a-day. Sometimes, it’s better to be elusive.