Longing for Roots & Finding Them

Recently I had the delightful opportunity to reconnect with a friend from my past.  She located Ed, my husband, through Facebook. We each wrote a long inmail outlining the years since we saw each other last, 1987. And then we skyped. We had been very good friends in Virginia Beach, and when we skyped, we just picked up where we left off. There was no need to ‘get to know’ each other.

This past Saturday I traveled with Ed to Houston for a reunion of a youth group he  led during the summer of 1972.  Though I knew no one at this festive gathering, it was heartwarming to watch everyone re-establish friendships after 38 years.  For many, it was as though no time had elapsed.

Over the years of my Facebook affiliation I have been able to rediscover the lives of many friends from high school, former workplaces, my childhood neighborhood., cousins who live far and away. 

At one time our lives were intermingled at some level and I knew much about their day-to-day activities. Over time we all became too busy with the day to day stuff of life, some of us moved as well and even more than once, making it difficult to continue frequent contact that keeps us involved in each others’ lives. I have been blessed with each new/old contact. I am thankful to know what’s going on in their lives again. Perhaps you’ve enjoyed some of the same Facebook experiences.

I have been pondering why these renewed relationships touch my heart so strongly.

I think it’s because I long for my roots.  I long to know well the place(s) where I began my journey as a child and into the changes of adulthood.  I have moved so many times in the past 40+ years and have had to make so many new friends along the way, that I often feel as if I am a lone star in the universe. My parents still live in the house we moved into when I was 4 years old.  When I visit them, I am still going home. I can go there and recall my past family life. But I’ve had countless encounters and associations with people other than my family.  And I have no place to ‘go home’ with them.

Social media has given us the chance to renew and rebuild or,  at the very least, just reconnect with past friends and acquaintances, as well as new. Social media has given us a way to ‘go home.’ Why is this good? Who we are today is a product of yesterday. Who we are in the present cannot be without acknowledgement of the past. Our past is part of our present. I am thankful to reconnect with my past because it reminds me that I did once belong and, since yesterday is part of today, I still do. Perhaps I have roots afterall. And that makes me feel secure for my future.