Last night we attended a wonderfully organized and sentimental birthday celebration to a beautiful and talented 80 year old youngster, Doris Blanchard. A little background on Ms. Doris: My husband has mentioned her many times in the years we have been together. It is obvious he loves her and now that I met her, I see why he is so fond of her. Greg’s mother, Ruby Miller worked with Ms. Doris at her beauty salon. I never had the honor of meeting Ms. Ruby either but now that I met Ms. Doris and others in her lively family, I can see how these two were great friends. This is one of the best results from our move back to Greg’s hometown. It was a delight to attend a great milestone in her life, but something tells me Ms. Doris will be around for a long time. I plan on devoting a blog post exclusively on her life in the near future as she is a very delightful and colorful character while exuding energy and a classy style with a little bling-bling in the mix. Attending this event brought this former post to mind about losing touch. I thought I would post this one prior to writing about Ms. Doris’s wild life adventure ride. Thanks to all of her children, allowing Greg and I to be part of this loving life tribute. We wish Ms. Doris many more happy birthdays!
TODAY THE WORDS are LOSING TOUCH. Life can be a funny thing. We start out as children, play with our friends and family, cousins included and make them our friends too. We start school and the school mate friendships start and build with some friends staying in our lives and others leaving when we either change schools or they do. Sometimes, in life with families moving, we lose touch with friends. We think about them from time to time and wonder how they are doing. Fate steps in with unexpected encounters of seeing them and there is joy in our hearts when we still see the child or the young teen we played, laughed, had fusses (for those not in the south, those are little arguments), shared food, enjoyed a good game of touch football, swam, etc. We try to catch up with stories and updates on current status, where we live, where they live, where we work, children, grandchildren, who we married, and so forth. We bridge gaps of times past, and it seems as if we return to a wonderful time in our lives, so why do we “lose touch”?
Every now and then, I think I should stop the Facebook process and every time when I think this, I see so many of my friends that I had lost touch, and I cannot lose touch again. It amazes me how I can be in one state, a great friend in Tennessee, California, Florida, Virginia, etc. and then so many of my dear friends still living in the same hometown as I did. I also find it wonderful that my husband who lived in a neighboring town has friends who are friends with me too. By social media or getting ourselves out there and touching base with friends, we stay in touch and that is a wonderful thing.
Family reunions or class reunions allow a reunion of people who have affected our lives dramatically. Photos are from a recent family reunion on my husband’s mother’s family.
I found an article with 8 tips for staying in touch:
THE BLOG 8 Tips for Keeping in Touch
Once you’ve met new people, the whole idea of keeping in touch can fill you with a sense of dread, guilt or fear if you don’t have the right strategies in place.
To help you out, here are 8 tips on effectively keeping in touch:
- Remember that you don’t need to keep in touch with everyone. It’s OK to sort through business cards at the end of a networking event and to decide who to follow up with for further discussion.
- You don’t need to keep in touch with everyone on the same frequency. It’s good to have a few people that you connect with more regularly, but it’s fine to cultivate other relationships on a 3-, 6- or 12-month basis.
- Use social media to your advantage by sharing news and reading updates without having to reach out to people on an individual basis.
- Even if you don’t own a business, you may want to consider sending out a mass e-mail to people every 6 months to a year. These kind of contacts could include past employers, old school friends or people who you met at conferences. Add them immediately to a group e-mail list (once you have their permission of course!). Then put a reminder to send the e-mail in your calendar and/or have it correspond with a memory cue like the anniversary of your business or January 1 or your birthday.
- For the people you want to connect with more often, consider setting up a recurring weekly phone call or lunch meeting so that spending time with them is naturally built into your schedule. If a recurring event won’t work, decide on your next meeting day and time at the end of each time you have together.
- Typically mentors or advisers can best offer you support on a monthly or quarterly basis. For these individuals, I recommend setting up either a recurring event at the correct frequency or setting your next time to talk at the end of each conversation (do you notice a pattern? )
- If you’re working on a particular type of project where you may need help or advice in the future, set up a place where you collect names and notes about individuals who could assist with that topic. I keep my list in a simple “People to Help with Book” Word document, but you can keep yours in any note taking tool.
- When people tell you to reach out to them when you’re in their geographic area, add them to a list of people in a particular city or put a searchable location note or tag on their profile in your contact management system. That way when you plan a trip, you can quickly and easily know who you could potentially visit.
Both my husband and I celebrate our love with dinner dates, outings, and trips and with that love, we cherish our families and friends and respect each other for having the love for God and others. As much as we love “our” times together, we look forward to the family and friend gatherings.
Now for the deeper thought…..Do we lose touch with our souls? Do we do a check on the status of how we are doing in the spiritual realm of life? Or do we experience the “losing touch” with the dearest friend we have in this life and beyond? When was the last time, we checked in God’s Facebook and made sure we are listed as God’s closest friends? I think of “Reach out and touch someone!” phrase and today is as good a day as any to reconnect or stay connected!
Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals”
