SENIOR MOMENT: Where are they now?

By BETTY MUNSEY/Columnist

A childhood song encouraged us to “make new friends but keep the old; some are silver, the other gold.“ These words still ring true yet have become more challenging in today’s mobile society. People enter and exit our lives similar to moving slowly through a revolving door since the average American moves 11 times in his lifetime.
Folks rarely moved during our childhoods unless your daddy was in the military or there was a death in the family. We expected our first-grade classmates to be a member of our graduating class 12 years later, and in most cases, that was true.
Locating former classmates has become one of the greatest challenges when planning class reunions. Sadly, some are deceased, a few are divorced with new names, and some have moved south to retirement villages.
Christmas card lists often reveal similar changes from year to year in those we knew and loved. Cards to Army buddies, who meant so much to us while serving together in Vietnam, Korea or Germany, are often returned as unknown by the postal service.
Five Roanoke area television personalities left WDBJ and WSLS stations in January and early February. Their departures left viewers with a sense of loss without their smiling cheerful faces greeting us as we poured our first cups of morning coffee. We had come to rely on their weather expertise to help us plan our day around their forecasts.  It takes a while to come to trust new personnel in such important positions.
We become dependent upon and trust medical personnel who treat our various senior ailments and our ministers who doctor our souls. We tell them some of our innermost secrets and value their opinions for our well-being.  We grieve when they move on to other jobs or places in their lives.
Sorting through old photos often reveals how our lives and friendships have changed through the years. If you’re like me, remembering all the names of those pictured is practically impossible. Yet shamefully, even today, I don’t always take time to write names and dates on the back of photos.
These people were an important part of our lives during the time period pictured, yet today we can’t remember their names and frequently, whether they’re alive or dead.
Privacy restrictions make searching for lost acquaintances more difficult.
Checking with their relatives still living in their hometown may provide links to their current location. High schools and colleges may have alumni listings available through the central office or the alumni association.
The computer offers various online classmate searches organized by graduation years and schools. A person can often be traced by checking with special interest groups or professional associations of which they may be a member. Government property records are considered public records that show current real estate holdings along with the owner’s present address.
A former co-worker made it her practice to always scan the local telephone book when traveling looking for possible distant relatives who share her unusual last name. Today the Internet has made the process much easier by Googling (a computer search term) their name or checking for their names in on-line telephone listings for particular areas. Finding long-lost friends and family members in our mobile society is challenging but not impossible.
A retired Extension agent, Betty Munsey lives and farms in Bland County.