Yes - I am in the process of doing that right now. The results are mixed but mostly positive. Without going into too much detail, we were very good friends for 3 years at my first job out of uni but when my contract ended we lost touch. It’s about 20 years later now and although I still enjoy their company the friendship is very different. It’s helped me reflect on how I’ve changed since then. Definitely worth it, but not without challenge.
Two friendships that I can think of, one was rekindled, one wasn’t and I’m not thinking of renkindling it either.
The first one was because my friend moved to another country and we just lost touch. I talked to him after about a year, he got angry at me because “why didn’t I write before”, I just Uno Reversed his ass and asked him the same question and he said “damn bro u right” and started talking again.
The second friendship, he started using me as his chauffeur, he was invited to my house at 3pm because I had university tests the next day, he showed himself up at 11pm with someone I didn’t know and I had to let them in to stay the night because my country wasn’t the safest.
He got drunk that night, made a mess in my house and left the next morning without saying shit and he was supposed to be my best friend. After that I straight up stopped talking to him.
Nowadays, my “best friend” has moved away from 3 different countries because he’s a drug dealer and he’s always using the product he has to sell or losing it somwhere and several people are looking for him, he lost 5 kg of cocaine in Argentina. The reason I know is because the first friend I mentioned in this comment is also a friend of his and he actually keeps up with his antics.
Yup. My childhood best friend reached out after learning that I was getting divorced a few years back. He lived out of state but was in town visiting family, so we got dinner. It was good to catch up. I ended up being one of his groomsmen and we still talk/game together, although distance still prevents us from meeting IRL too often.
I’m marrying his ex-wife.
I keep trying this, usually when I come across someone in my contacts who I haven’t seen in a decade or something. Particularly after deleting Facebook a few years ago, I want to keep up with people.
It’s always the same pattern though. We hang out, have a great time, sometimes do it one or two more times, and then it just never happens again. The problem is that it’s always me doing the lifting. I have to remember to call, set up some plan, make the thing happen. If I don’t do the work, it doesn’t work.
I generally end up deciding that it’s not worth my time to fight so hard to see someone who obviously isn’t interested in prioritizing time with me.
One or two have maintained touch, but there’s probably a dozen more who fell back off the map. Forever the optimist though, I’ve got another one on the calendar in a couple weeks.
