The Post-High School Ring of Friends

[Scarim Coral]

Well I guess you used to have good friends back in High School. As for me, I did had people to chat to and I guess I would called them friends but not true friend especially the closest ones I hang out with. They were pretty much a holes who I refuse to keep in touch with these days.
University was somewhat similar althought I did make genine friends this time round and still keep in touch with. In saying so the degee I took had 30 student and only 3 of them I had keep in touch with the longest. I mean sure I did tried to keep in touch (well granted it is my own fault for refusing to meet up with them in person due to the travel cost) with the others or at least stayed in the loop but I'm fine that I lost touch with them. I mean I still heard one of two info from them thanks to Facebook.

 

[Chemical Alia]

It wasn't until after high school that I HAD enough friends to form a ring around me. But then there were army friends, and college friends, and grad school friends, and most of them live 1000+ miles from me in any given direction now.

I know a lot of people have trouble making friends once they're out in the working world. One good thing about working in a game studio is that you do surround yourself with a lot of people with similar interests (or at least video games, haha). I might be a little shy when I first start a job, but I've always been able to make some good friends, so I consider myself lucky in that regard. Of course now, I work from home, and I rarely interact in person with the rest of humanity!

I also consider myself fortunate that my best friend from the age of 3 weeks old is still my best friend. I just wish we could still hang out, since she lives halfway across the country from me. :C

 

[Scars Unseen]

I can't even remember most of the people that I hung out with in high school. Probably doesn't help that I went to 4 of them. I moved around a lot until about 7 years ago. Amusingly enough, I have now lived in the same area of Japan for longer than I have ever spent anywhere back in the States. I make friends where I am, and don't really have time to spend on people on the other side of the planet.

Except you guys. You're alright. Most of the time.

 

[Aerosteam]

Yeah, it's true this normally happens.

I sooo can't wait to start going to collage/uni and make some new friends, the ones I have now kinda suck ass.

My birthday is coming up, I don't even want to invite some people over because they can't be bothered, all they're focussed on is trying to get high, look cool and pull. In the earlier years of high school we used to go to someone's house and play video games but now everyone else has become really boring and don't want to do anything together.

 

[FPLOON]

Holy shit, OP! I had a similar experience... Then again, those kind of "friends" are still my "friends" on Facebook, so there's that...

I only called someone my friend outright, let alone my best friend, if I hung out with them outside of school... It's not to say I don't have many friends[footnote]Heh... Did not mean to obscurely reference a LN series turned anime series[/footnote], but that's just how I am... (as well as how I was raised...) Add that to knowing them for a very long time just makes me trust them more and more, thus allowing me to invite them to hang out with me more and/or, ultimately, celebrating my birthday like I'm not going to die that day...

So yeah, it's common for shit like that to happen after high school... Too bad Facebook doesn't know any better... *shrugs*

 

[Belaam]

Pretty standard. I'm in my late 30s. My friends that I hang out with even remotely regularly are a mix of family, co-workers, neighbors, half dozen college friends and maybe two high school friends.

It's a lot easier to base friendships on the shared experiences of high school than it is the wildly different lives most people live after high school. The single recent college graduate is not going to have as much to talk about with the parent with a retail job. There will be some shared interests, and those may get stronger later down the line, but there is a definite falling away.

I've also noticed that, at least on Facebook, I've become closer with people I didn't know well from high school because our interests have evolved in similar directions.

 

[Eamar]

It's normal. I was by no means unpopular at school, and I had a fair few friends I was very close to at the time, but after we all went our separate ways I ended up ditching everyone. Seriously, I am in contact with zero people from my school (and they weren't terrible people or anything). The harsh truth is that at university, where I have a far larger pool of people to choose from, I found much better friends. People I had a lot more in common with and with whom I genuinely "clicked", not people I just happened to spend several years in close proximity to. This is proven by the fact that our group is still going as strong as ever despite the fact that half of us have now graduated and we're scattered all over the country.

Seriously, there's nothing like removing the enforcement of time together for making you realise how little you know people/how you have nothing to talk about other than school/how, when you actually stop and think about it and don't have to rub along for everyone's sake, you straight up don't like some of your school "friends".

Here's the thing about most of the people you consider friends in high school, you were only friends with each other because you were forced to be in school every day. Most of the people you're friends with in high school aren't really your friends because they enjoy your company so much, but because you're the least shitty person to hang out with in the place you both have to be. Sure, real lasting friendships can definitely be established in high school, but the majority of your high school friendships will fall by the wayside once you're no longer tied together by the fact that you're forced to spend time in the same place every day.

Basically this.

Also, people just move on. Hell, one girl was my best friend all the way through primary and secondary school - that's 14 years. When we were kids we used to be practically joined at the hip, did everything together. People would refer to us as a pair, rarely as individuals. But by the end of school we both realised that we'd grown up to be very different people with different preferences and desires, and we were only clinging to the "best friends" label because it was what we'd always done. Like when people stay in unfulfilling relationships because it's familiar and easy and nothing really "bad" has happened to force it to end. We just quietly went off to different universities and lost contact, no hard feelings. Such is life.

 

[Someone Depressing]

In high school, I had three or four really good friends. Not many. Now that I've graduated and gotten a job, I can hardly remember their faces.

People just move on. The book The Body spells it out the best... aka, Stand By Me. Aside from being really really really gay (probably unintentionally) one of the major themes of the movie is how even though the characters agree that those 2 days were the best of their lives, how they drifted apart and forgot about each other, but not those two days they spent looking for a corpse.

The same is pretty much true in real life. Maybe not the corpse part, though.

 

[sc1arr1]

Thats fairly normal. I had a good amount of friends in high-school. Now i've got three, and only two of them are really super good friends. (third one is...well..a major asshole and I'd rather not associate with him >.>)

 

[michael87cn]

High school is like prison for children. It gives them all a place to stay away from the adult world. Oh, and sometimes they learn things too. But the point is, groups form and 'friendships' are made in school. But they're not usually real -- people do it to 'get by' or 'get through' school. Once they're out, they either sit at home all day and goof off or get jobs.

My point is, its not you. It's just how it works. It happens at work too. You get to know people and talk to them all day, and you think you know them/are friends. But then they quit their job and just disappear on you. (or get fired) and its like you never existed.

Real friends become more like, family. You KNOW you can depend on them and that they'll always be there for you, that's the thing though. Not many people are willing to do that for a 'friend'. So yeah, not many real friendships exist. Sadly... plenty of people convince themselves that THEIR 'friend(s)' are actually real...

Time will tell is all I can say to them . . .

It's really sad.