Archives for August 2009

Thanks to the amazing power of Facebook I just came into contact with another friend from my past and I can’t say that I am entirely thrilled about it. Sometimes we inadvertently lose contact with people and sometimes it is intentional.

I can tell you unequivocally that this was an intentional thing on my part. You see Marty (not his real name) was one of those people who had to one up you at everything. No one ever got a better deal on a car, knew of a better restaurant or had better ideas for a good time. Marty was a maven at anything and everything.

What he wasn’t good at was knowing when to shut his mouth or give other people credit. His superstar personality and supersized ego did an excellent job of burning through friendships like there was no tomorrow. We got to be friendly shortly after one of his relationships flamed out.

Initially I blamed the break up for his behavior. I figured that he was heart broken and this was how he was compensating, but that turned out not to be true. Marty was a putz, a yutz and a giant pain in the ass. That is not to say that I am perfect, I have my share of flaws, but I have enough sense not to tell the Native Americans that I discovered America. He did not.

Anyway some twent years or so ago I got to the point where I couldn’t take it anymore and decided that it was time to let him go. Since I didn’t want to be a jerk I made a point of letting go over the summer. I was working at a sleepaway camp for the summer and cellphones weren’t ubiquitous so it made it easy to just kind of fade away.

I hadn’t thought about the guy in years until today when I received a message via Facebook from him. Spent a few minutes emailing back and forth and learned that he is still the same guy. Apparently he began blogging not so long ago and was only too happy to try and tell me how popular he is and how he is a great daddy blogger.

It was kind of a funny exchange because it never occurred to him that I would know what a blog is or that I might even be a blogger. Instead he prattled on about himself and suggested that I might consider trying it out, blogging that is. And even better, he offered to teach me how to do it.

I was momentarily tempted to send him the URL of my blog if for no other reason than to remind him that there is a big world out there and people besides him are capable of discovering things. But I really didn’t want to deal with all of his nonsense, not to mention he is the guy who will spend hours going through the archives to see if I have written about him.

Well, now I have. Thank you dear friend for reminding me why I let go in the first place. BTW, I do have a blog and I am not impressed that your stats show that 50 people read you every day.

Love,

Jack

P.S. Don’t take this personally, but I don’t think we’ll be getting that drink any time soon.

Periodically I like to share worthwhile causes with you. The Bob Woodruff Foundation is one of them. It is a good way to support our troops.