Friend Request

I had a childhood friend who was half Norwegian, half Japanese.

Looking back, that's an unusual combination. At the time, I never thought about it. What mattered was whether hanging out was fun. With him, it was never boring. The fun just went in questionable directions.

We walked across the roof of an apartment building. High enough to die if you fell. We rode bikes into a river to see how far we could float. Today that would make the news. Back then, someone's parent yelled at us and that was that. Different era. I almost wrote "he was a wild kid," but he'd probably say the same about me. Fair enough.

Before middle school, he moved to Australia. I never found out why Australia. A third country, neither Norway nor Japan. Kids don't ask those questions.

We exchanged letters. No email, no smartphones. Write a reply, stick on a stamp, drop it in the mailbox, wait. The cycle got slower. Eventually it stopped. Maybe his address changed. Maybe we both got busy. I don't even remember why. But every now and then, his face would surface — laughing on that rooftop.

The world changed. Social media appeared, and suddenly you could search for anyone by name. When Facebook reached Japan, I typed in his name on a whim.

There he was.

I could see traces of the kid I knew. But he was holding a child. The boy who walked across rooftops had become a solid-looking father. Australian sky stretched behind him in the profile photo.

That was enough.

I didn't send a friend request. Didn't write a message. He was doing well. That was all I needed to know. I wanted those memories to stay where they were. I didn't want him to feel what I'd just felt — the weight of all that time.

I don't like social media. I won't pretend I'm above wanting approval. Other people's posts give me a push sometimes. But the time spent scrolling never feels worth it. Laziness wins. Still, being able to confirm that a childhood friend on the other side of the planet was alive and well — that was one of the few decent things social media ever gave me.

Letters stop arriving. But you can still know someone exists. Sometimes that's enough.