I don’t know how to make myself unavailable. If a friend needs me, I’m there. This may remind you of the movie “Yes Man” with Jim Carrey and Zoey DeChanel, but it’s not like I have a rule to say “yes” to any need from my friends but I am always available to those who are close to me. What do I mean by “close to me”? Many of us are involved in social sites and have a slew of friends on the internet that are associated with us, but not close to us. You know who these people are. I’m a Facebook curmudgeon. I don’t care about the games. I don’t care about people knowing what I’m doing all day every day, and I don’t care about what any of my friends had for lunch. The only part I like about Facebook is the messaging section. There are only about 3 people on facebook that send me messages, but hundreds that post what they ate for lunch that day. The people that send me messages are people that also have my email address and phone number, so there’s no real reason for it for me. We all learned about Facebook suggestions when we signed up. It was like magic. Facebook could find those people that we were connected with at some point or another in life, and re-connect us. Like Montel Williams, only more amazing.
There are the people that Facebook suggested you be friends with because they went to school with you. These suggestions fall into different groups. When I look through the suggestions facebook has for me, I start sorting these people into the groups. Some people fall into the “Oh, I can’t believe I hadn’t added this person before, they are practically my BFF.” Group. Then there’s the people that make me think, “Yes, I should probably add this person, because we were acquaintances in high school.” Then there are the people that I look at and think, “I remember going to school with this person, but did we ever even talk? Did we have a class together?” Then there are the suggestions that everyone dreads. Facebook suggests that you be friends with your ex girlfriend from high school. You know, the one that sliced your tires. Facebook wants you to be friends with the English teacher that flunked you. Facebook wants Batman to be friends with The Joker…since they are both from Gotham. I digress. I have often wondered why Facebook doesn’t have a dislike button somebody should really look into that.. My point is that Facebook gives us the illusion I’ll keeping up with a friendship. What it really does it makes it easier to appear friendly without much effort. In much the same way that texting makes it easier to communicate with a person you’d rather not speak to. I think I just made myself sound really old
I am consistently available for my friends that fall into the category of “closeness”, whatever that means to you.
If you want to have better relationships with your friends, try being available for them. Answer your phone when they call. Everyone knows that most of us have caller ID. And not many people like to leave voice mails.