I’m not generally a sentimental person. At least in my adulthood; as a child and teenager, I had massive issues with separation anxiety and attachment, likely because of being bounced around my first two years of life (foster care, bio mother, foster care, adoption) and, well, I wasn’t a happy kid. I also grew up partly on a fishing resort in Alexandria, MN, which was fantastic (and I have more fond memories of that than anything else in my childhood), but also meant saying goodbye, weekly, to friends I’d made, as they went home to the Twin Cities, or Illinois, or Iowa.

I used to have to keep every memento, every scrap of paper or photograph or tangible evidence of life experiences, even to the point of obsession. It was seriously as if the event didn’t happen unless there were written or photographic proof.  Boxes filled.  Drawers were overflowing. Add to this the fact that throughout my depression- and anxiety-ridden adolescence, I kept a journal (oy, vey, the horror of that now), which became a ginormous stack of wire notebooks, filled with the most godawful declarations of angst and despair imaginable.

My stepdaughter from my first marriage, Veronica, now twenty-two and living the academic boho life in California, also recalls that I would photograph her every move. (She also recalls that I would always have Kleenex on my person, and together, these two things raise my Motherly Quotient.)

Along the way, however, something changed. I know I, myself, got healthier, in some ways–I no longer need photographic proof.  Ironically, this movement toward not needing memory-enhancements coincides with my own once-perfect memory losing its strength from middle-age and, mostly, effects of auto-immune diseases and fibromyalgia, but that’s another story. I recently saw a Michael Moore tweet that pretty much sums up my viewpoint, in some ways: “More crazy things we believe:Taking a picture of our kid getting his diploma is better than watching it w/ our eyes& storing it in our brain.”

Or, on the other hand, it’s less to do with noble philosophy and clutter and more to do with I really don’t want to remember a lot of things from my youth.

I have never attended a class reunion, for starters, and don’t really see a time when I will.  High School was miserable; I was bullied, I hated myself, and I still cringe when I see the building. Ick. For the most part, people I went to school with that I wanted to stay in touch with, I have–or I’ve reconnected in other ways–and I have absolutely no desire to buy a fancy dress to try to impress people who never liked me, nor I them, and listen to horrid 80s music that I couldn’t stand the first time around, spending money I do not have. (Okay, a slight bit of bitterness, perhaps…ahem…)

But I have lost touch with people from my past that I did like, and would like to talk to again, which brings me to today.  I dreamt this morning, before waking, of a couple of these people.  In this case, the kids of neighboring resort owners, kids I used to hang with quite a bit. Thinking of those two led me to think of others, and thus I’ve just spent the last two hours combing the internet, trying to locate them.  One of them I had a good lead on–I’ve been in contact with family members, etc.–and I’ve just posted to her brother’s facebook that I would like to get in contact with her (Julie B., are you out there?). She’s in St. Petersburg, FL, doing very well, and I seriously just watched nearly an entire online medical presentation about cleft palate babies because my old friend, a speech and language pathologist, was one of the presenters.  She looks exactly as I remember her at 16, dammit…

The other was tougher.  I found her mother’s obituary, eventually, which made me sad to see, and that, in turn, pointed toward Oregon where my friend now lives.  However, my friend has a very, very common name, and that’s as far as I’ll get right now, it seems.

Today’s activity leads me to a couple of conclusions.  First, the internet can be entirely scary. I did a search on my name (after finding the tool) and you can see a picture of my house. I’m not about to pay the money to find out if the site is accurate as to my hobbies, religion, and income. Second, nostalgia can hit at the oddest times, but perhaps it’s because I’m moving and saying goodbye to yet another place and group of people that’s triggered this. (Not to mention avoidance of sorting and packing…)

After my divorce in the late 90s, I found I wasn’t able to let go quite as quickly as I’d want to.  I’m not big on process, and I don’t deal well with the non-logical (i.e. emotional) aspects of life when they consume me. I sought a therapist, who pointed out something that should have been obvious to me: because of my attachment issues, I don’t do goodbyes. I’ve always avoided them.  I recently was explaining to my husband and a close friend, here, that I’m thrilled that I didn’t find my new job until my school year was over, because facing saying “goodbye” or having others say it would have been murder. I’m far better at just sneaking out in the middle of the night, leaving a note, and starting new without looking back as much as possible.  Which works fine, until it’s a divorce, of course, or others don’t understand and assume I don’t care.

And, I suspect, such behavior also tends to lead toward the frantic, “OH MY GOD I HAVE TO FIND JULIE!” moments twenty-five years later on a Saturday morning.