On the cusp of change.
The move my wife and I are planning to Toronto has forced me to reflect on the friends I’ll leave behind, but also those that I have left behind in the past. 10 years ago I had begun to establish business relationships in the Detroit area film/video industry, and at that time I was too young to appreciate what I had done. Unfortunately, because of that, I didn’t do much to stay in contact with anyone I knew from the area.
Now that I’m older, I realize what a mistake that was and am making an effort to make sure I don’t repeat my mistake. Being the web application geek I am, I’ve been using http://www.linkedin.com. After gathering the contact for several of my current friends and contacts, I began to reflect about those I left behind in the Motor City.
Last night I spent the better part of 5 hours searching the web to try and track down a handful of the people I had worked with in the past. After that effort I had only been able to locate two. It remains to be seen if either of them return my messages, or if I even had enough impact on their lives that they will remember who I am. I personally hope they do, and was actually disappointed that I had not heard from either at the end of the day.
Some of the friends I’ve added to my “network”, are no older than I was when I was so willing to move on to the “next great thing”. I just hope they do a better job than I did of staying connected with those relationships they are building today.